After the Falls

Day three of our trip to Portland started with another drive out of the city. Another drive back to the east, in fact -- but the weather was better on this day for being outdoors, and that's what we had planned. We went to Multnomah Falls.

Though I'd never heard of the falls before researching things to do in the Portland area, it's purportedly the most-visited natural site in the Pacific Northwest, and the highest waterfall in the state. Indeed, it was fairly crowded when we visited. We arrived just early enough to snag one of the last available parking spots along the interstate, about a quarter-mile away. Already, the road in front of the lodge right near the falls had a half-mile parade of circling cars that didn't subside the entire time we were there.

The falls themselves are quite beautiful, with the century-old bridge in front of them a nice accent for your pictures. You do pretty much have to elbow through other tourists for your few seconds on the bridge, but it still felt worth the effort. There are also miles of hiking trails around Multnomah Falls, and we had plans to hit one of them.

The hike we'd picked beforehand turned out to be closed off -- Oneonta Gorge, a short trek through water, has been closed for many months now. But at the lodge, someone directed us to a trail with two key waypoints: Lemmons Viewpoint, an overlook with a gorgeous view of the Columbia River, and Fairy Falls, a much smaller but much less-visited waterfall up in the hills. The three mile round trip hike took a while (and my legs were definitely sore that night and the next morning), but was a nice change of pace from what we'd been doing so far.

After the hike, we drove back into Portland and stopped at Von Ebert Brewing. This was located right by a golf course (like the winery from the day before; must be an Oregon thing). It turned out not to be our favorite spot, and the beer we'd most wanted to sample had blown just before we got there... but they did have an interesting Irish Cream themed stout, and a solid Hefeweizen.

Next stop was Cider Bite, which was definitely a highlight of the tasting part of the trip. Denver does have some delicious ciders, but the Pacific Northwest has more. Way more. Enough that a place like this can exist: a taproom that, instead of offering dozens of beers from dozens of places, does that for cider. We went through two different flights of delicious ciders, and easily would have stuck around for more were we not so tired from the earlier hike. We ultimately had to regroup for a while back at our hotel before heading back out for dinner and a last couple of stops.

We did get back out for two more beer stops later in the evening, and both were solid. The first, Great Notion Brewing, had been recommended to us a couple days earlier by the helpful locals. It had the widest selection of any brewery we visited, including a Blueberry Muffin that tasted exactly as promised, and an equally delicious (but different) Moon Pie Imperial Stout. Finally, we headed over to Cascade Brewing, renowned for its sour beers. A small taster flight was all we could handle by this point -- we do love sour beers, but there's only so much of them the stomach will allow.

This was our last full day in Portland, but our flight the next day was late in the afternoon. That gave us time to squeeze in a few more stops...