Portland was definitely one of my top 5 vacations. We went there in June of 2005. We stayed downtown and didn't even rent a car. We just walked or took the tram everywhere. The city was very clean and safe to walk around. The week we were there, it only rained once. Of course this was the day that we walked 2 miles across the river. When we got out of the Oregon Science Museum, it started pouring, so we ended up calling a cab to get back to our hotel.

I didn't take many pictures and I didn't even take any pictures of the river, but we had a nice time.

Like most cities we visit, we had to go to the zoo just to see if their giraffes or elephants look like ours. The Oregon Zoo is huge with a lot of nice exhibits. I think they are known for their elephant exhibit.

You can take a little zoo train that takes you uphill to the International Rose Test Gardens. I guess they test how different roses will grow and turn out. I don't know how many acres it makes up, but it was huge and there are more than 7,500 rose bushes there. You also get a great view of downtown from here. We also went to the Chinese Garden in Chinatown.

The food was great also. We had a lot of seafood and found a great Irish restaurant.

The science museum had an IMAX theatre, a lot of science exhibits and an old U.S. Navy submarine from the 50's called the U.S.S. Blueback. We went inside the submarine and it was pretty small. It was the smallest class of submarines and it ran on diesel.

We also did lame stuff in Portland, like go to the mall and catch 4 movies. We even went to a AAA baseball game and watched the Portland Beavers.