I left my heart in Portland, Oregon

When it comes to travel, I like it for leisure, but not for business. However, sometimes I do need to travel for my job, going away for a conference is one of those trips that I have to take.

Early this year, I was scheduled to attend the BCBSA 2008 Information Management Symposium held in Portland, Oregon in the third week of September, I waited until the last minute to book the flight, thought it would be an exhausting three days sitting in sessions that I was obliged to participate, little did I know it turned out to be a memorable trip as the City of Roses has captured my heart.

I flew out of Oakland airport on Alaska Airlines early Sunday morning. It's only five hundred and forty-three miles and the flight took one hour and fifty-five minutes. By the time when I checked into Portland Marriott Downtown Waterfront hotel, it's already noon. Since the symposium's registration and the welcome reception didn't start until 5:00 pm, and after the failed attempt, as none of the tour agents work on Sunday, by the hotel concierge to book a city tour for me, I decided to explore the city on my own.

Portland, Oregon is a city located near the confluence of the Columbia and Willamette rivers, where the Willamette runs through its downtown. It has ten drawbridges, that drawn up for the passages of riverboats, link the east and west side of the city, and a four-mile loop of walkway around the riverbank. My hotel is situated on the far south end on the water front.

My first stop was to have lunch at Marina Fish House, a floating restaurant with exclusive view of downtown Portland and the Willamette River, that sits on the river a few blocks south of my hotel near Marquam bridge.

I ordered a broiled salmon, but was surprised to see the waiter brought me a plate of petti pastries since I don't have sweet tooth and I normally shy away from sweets. Oh, I should know better that Sunday brunch always comes with a spread of baked goods, but how tempting it was with such a beautiful plate of petti pastries in front of me! I took a few bites, asked the waiter to take it away before I ate it all. It's an enjoyable first meal in Portland, not only the salmon was very fresh and delicious but also the extremely friendliness of the waiter. It's a pleasant dinning experience.

After lunch, I walked past a stretch of boutique shops, outdoor cafes, Standford's restaurant along the riverbank to catch the Streetcar to Powell's bookstore. Portland Streetcar is owned and operated by the City of Portland, free to public within the city center. I hopped into the first car in sight, just to find out it's a southbound car to the direction of Oregon Health and Science University when a friendly couple told me so. I needed to take the northbound car that runs through downtown.

In this beautiful, golden yellow car, I struck a conversation with an old couple from the Midwest. They were in Portland waiting to board the riverboat for their cruise vacation. A woman came over sitting by me when she heard that I come from San Francisco area, that I was in Portland for a three-day conference, and that I wanted to explore Portland in a Sunday afternoon. She was a transplant from San Francisco area where her relatives are, and she was drawn to Portland by her natural beauty, the slower pace of life, and a city made for walkers. As the streetcar moved through the city center, she pointed out the area of interests to me, such as the public library, the film center, and the unique shops. She also suggested that, after my visit to the Powell's bookstore, I might visit Chinatown and the Portland Classical Chinese Garden as they are only a few blocks away.

I thanked her, jumped off the car, snapped a shot of the streetcar, happily walked around looking for Powell's when I came upon these three young street musicians. I stood listening for a few minute, took a shot, willing dropped a greenback when the young girl beckoned me for a donation, then walked across the street into the bookstore.

No wonder Powell's is the world largest independent bookstore, it sits on an entire city block with over one million of new and used books in the building. The books are housed in different rooms by categories in the Pearl room, the Red room, the Purple room, the Rose room, the Orange room, the Gold and Coffee rooms, the Green and Blue rooms. It's so big that one could spend days there without cover even an inch of it. I spent two hours in the Blue room where it houses shelves after shelves of literature. By the time I left, I picked up ten books to have the store ship them to my house in California.

From Powell's, I walked eight blocks east to Chinatown, a tiny area of few blocks dotted with Chinese shops and restaurants, that looks fairly empty compared to that in San Francisco. But the sun never sets on the Chinese people and Chinese restaurants, anywhere I go there are Chinese restaurants and Chinatown, no matter how small it is.

Portland Classical Chinese Garden is located at two blocks north of Chinatown. The garden is a joint effort between two sister cities of Portland and Suzhou, China. During the construction years, there were more than 60 Chinese artisans from China worked on building the garden. It's the most beautiful, authentic Chinese garden outside China and Taiwan that I have seen. I couldn't help feeling a sense of pride, as an American Chinese or a Chinese American. It felt like an oasis in the middle of a busy city, where authentic Chinese art of tea is served. Of course, I took my afternoon tea there.

As the sun gradually set, the streets were flooded with warm rays of sunshine inviting me to explore more, yet I didn't have enough time to visit the International Rose Test Garden, a five plus acres garden in Washington Park. Legend has it that in the early 1900's Portland had twenty miles of rose-bordered streets, as a result, Portland was known as "City of Roses".

After consulting my visitor's map, I decided to walk back to the hotel through Tom McCall Waterfront Park that runs along the west bank of the Willamette river for the length of downtown. It's approximate twenty blocks from the Chinese Garden to my hotel in a pleasant forty-five minutes walk.

There were two outings on the schedules of the Symposium, wine testing and dinner at Willamette Valley Vineyards on Monday night and Columbia River Gorge tour on Tuesday afternoon.

Willamette Valley Vineyards is in Salem, the capital of Oregon, located approximate fifty miles south of Portland. The tour lady explained how they make the different kind of wine, the labels made from different grapes from different vineyards, and the distinct test of each label. Since I am not a wine drinker, I didn't remember anything that she said. But I enjoyed the outing after a day of sessions sitting in the hotel conference rooms.

Tuesday afternoon's we picked up our own lunch box, boarded a bus heading to Columbia River Gorge, "a spectacular river canyon cutting the only sea-level route through the Cascade Mountain Range, 80 miles long and up to 4,000 feet deep with the north canyon walls in Washington State and the south canyon walls in Oregon State." It's so beautiful that I want to come back for a hiking vacation. I was so taken by the natural beauty that I wish to capture it with a better camera. Fortunately, there are so many great images on the Internet free for all to see.

We had a quick stop at the vista first to get the best view of the gorge. The handsome building on the left is the visitor center. It's so windy that made the hair of Jennifer and mine fly.

Next, we stopped at Multnomah Falls, the longest falls in the gorge area, for thirty minutes just long enough for a short hike a little close to the Falls. How I wish to have enough time to hike up to the head of the Falls!

Our third and the last stop was the Columbia Gorge Hotel, a well-appointed Italian style villa built in 1921 with sweeping view of the river. It's such an enchanting place that I wish to come for a few days.

With an hour drive back to the hotel, we were late for dinner and a jazz concert, said so our bus driver and tour guide. Reluctantly, I got on the bus again wishing that I could stay a little longer.

The jazz concert was so loud, not my type of music, I slipped out of it with two of my colleagues right after dinner. We took a nice walk along the riverbank, ended up in McCormick's Fish House & Bar for a drink. I knew it when Stefan and Smit walked out of the concert with me that they would find an excuse for another drink. It's amazing to see how they opened up telling me about their family lives outside the office. We left the bar after an hour, I went to the exercise room for another thirty minutes on the treadmill, and they went to the bar in the hotel for another drink.

I left Portland for California around 2:30 pm on Wednesday, the last day of the Symposium. On my way home, I kept thinking how unusual it is that I left my heart in Portland, a city more European than American, a city so clean, made for walkers, the Powell's bookstore, the gardens, and the rivers are so attractive to me that I want to visit again.