Day Trip to Oregon — some saltwater

Alec and I decided to disregard all of our responsibilities and take a day trip to Oregon to see the location for the filming of the Disney original movie Halloweentown.

Work hard, play hard I guess.

We're weird; I think I've known this since we became best friends freshman year. Separate from each other, we're relatively normal, bit quirky, but normal nonetheless. Together, we're the most ridiculous people you'll ever meet, with dreams, aspirations, jokes, strange sayings where you'll think WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE??

Well, we're also idiots. We decided it would be a great idea to leave around 5:30 am. I went to bed late because I had to finish an assignment. Alec is Alec and is always late. The drive down to Oregon was brutal (to say the least). We were absolutely tired, and it was pitch black until about 8 am which made matters even worse. Thank goodness for the many Starbucks and McDonalds along the way which provided stopping points and provisions to keep us going.

Once the sun had risen, we perked up a bit more and rehashed our greatest moments together while talking about people, places, and things.

Our first destination for the day was Multnomah Falls, an iconic Pacific Northwest waterfall that you've probably seen on Instagram, in a travel magazine, or on a poster somewhere. I've been dying to go here ever since I figured out that it was about 30 minutes away from Portland.

In my head, I had imagined this place to be at the end of a hike as you emerge from the forest and there is a gigantic waterfall in front of you. Lo and behold, you pull off the main road into a designated parking lot, walk under a railroad track and past the gift shop directly to a look out for the falls. I'd be lying if I said I wasn't disappointed.

I quickly got over my disappointment, and we trudged up the walkway to get a better view of the falls and the area around us. I have to say, this was an awesome time of the year to come, we hit it just as the leaves were beginning change. And once you got past all of the selfie sticks, it was quite a beautiful place.

Back to the car we went and made our way to Portland. The coffee from earlier was finally kicking and we were wide awake and buzzing with excitement.

Portland is awesome. In my mind, it's a smaller version of Seattle, a bit more quaint and neighborly with food and shopping GALORE. Also, no sales tax hey hey. It's always such a good time in Portland. Anyway, since this whole day was kind of spontaneous, we had no plan. I have a few lists going for various locations, and I rattled off restaurants and sights we could go to in PDX. Because it was only maybe 10 am when we rolled into town, I navigated us to Pip's Original Doughnuts.

As I mentioned, food is a thing here. Until you've been to Portland, I don't think you'll be able grasp the magnitude of restaurants and food carts that proliferate throughout the city. For some reason, a specialty of the city is doughnuts. From what I have gathered, the trifecta of renowned doughnuts consists of the famous VooDoo Doughnuts and Blue Star Donuts, with Pip's to complete the holy trinity.

With any popular location, there was a bit of a line, but it gave us enough time to debate on what to order. In the end, we opted for one dozen because we're horrible at making decisions. On our way out, I wanted a picture of the cute exterior. As I snapped away, there was a man walking his dog and offered to take our picture.

Somehow we struck up a quick conversation about the area and how he was from Boston. The people in Portland are so nice and friendly! Also, his dog was the cutest!

After that pleasant interaction, Alec and I walked back to the car and devoured the doughnuts...so much for a long lasting snack. With each doughnut, we did a calculated taste test. My favorite by far was the Nutella and Alec's the classic sugar. Pip's sits slightly outside the main downtown area, and as we made our way there we came across Black Hat Books.

We spotted the bookstore in passing and immediately turned the car right around to pop in. The bookstore was a lovely local gem, full of gently used secondhand books pertaining to Portland values. It was fun to browse the collection. Alec is a bibliophile and bought at least seven books.

Back on track to downtown Portland, we found a parking spot in the Pearl District and roamed the surrounding stores and galleries.

Eventually, we made our way to the famous Powell's Books and wandered the rows and rows of books. We gave ourselves an allotted amount of time to explore and then meet back in the green room to give us enough time to get back to the car before I got a ticket. I could spend hours in here. When the time was up, I had eight books in my hands, Alec had a whole basket full. Together we deliberated on what books to buy. I've made a rule for myself to buy a book from Powell's every time I go. I ended up getting Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari and The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell. Alec ended up adding eleven more books to his collection.

The day was slowly slipping away, and the afternoon had crept up on us. Our original plan was to grab a nice lunch, but we scratched that idea and scurried to the car, found a block full of food carts, and ate on the go.

Well, rather than on the go, it was sitting in Portland Traffic as we left the city. We slowly made our way to Saint Helens, Oregon for the main attraction of the day. The long, desolate drive made us question why people live WAY out here. To each their own.

As we arrived in town, we haphazardly guessed where the downtown area was. We made our way through neighborhoods and stores, until we finally hit the downtown area.

Quite honestly, I don't know what we were expecting. We quickly found a parking spot and started laughing uncontrollably. As one girl in the group walking ahead of us to the town square remarked, it's SO small. AND IT WAS. But it looked exactly like the movie with the looming clock tower and giant jack-o-lantern.

We milled around the halloween inspired memorabilia and called it a day. I bet it would have been more fun had there been an event going on or a parade, but I wouldn't necessarily make a special trip for it unless you LOVE the movie. Anyway, we saw it and accomplished our goal.

We made our way back to Seattle recounting the hilarious let down of Halloweentown and other events from the day. I'd say it was a successful day trip with my best friend!