After our fun night out last night, drinking beer in a bar 30 stories above the city, we've had a fairly easy going day but managed to see plenty of Portland.

We started off the day with a big breakfast at Byways Cafe, just down the road from the hostel, before taking a walk to Powell's City of Books, the largest independent used and new book store in the world. Covering a whole city block over 4 floors, the place was massive. We managed to find some 2nd hand travel books for the next part of our journey before moving on.

We took a walk through the downtown area to the Willamette River and walked along it for a bit. It was a bit breezy and we didn't find it the most amazing setting, so we cut back into downtown through a shopping mall to Pioneer Square, a big plaza in the centre of town. The downtown area seems to have the same small-town feel of the area where the hostel is, with clean open streets, but without the quaint old fashioned houses and not quite as many trees lining the roads.

From Pioneer Square we walked a couple of blocks to an area where two parking lots over two blocks are crammed around the edges with street carts selling every kind of street food imaginable. After about half an hour walking around deciding what to eat, and after a while talking to 'The Frying Scotsman', an ex-offshore chef from Ardrossan who now lives in Portland, I finally decided on a BBQ pulled pork sandwich and Lucy had some soup from different cart. The food was amazing, and after enjoying it we were refuelled for some more walking.

We headed up through town, climbing the hills through gorgeous residential streets with big old (by American standards) houses along tree-lined streets to Washington Park, a huge sprawling park overlooking the city. We wandered through the park for a while with its huge conifers and pink blossoming cherry trees, checking out the rose garden, and pausing for a while at the thought-provoking holocaust memorial before making our way down a steep winding path through a wooded hillside back to the neighbourhood our hostel is in.

After walking back to the hostel in the sunsine, we've spent the rest of the evening sorting out photos and doing some research for the next part of the trip, heading down the Oregon coast into California. Portland is a really nice, relaxed city with a very vibrant cultural feel, not to mention a lot of great beer, and I'd definitely like to return, but I'm looking forward to moving on and seeing more of the Pacific coastline.

I've picked out some spots to stop tomorrow and hopefully our first campsite. Internet availability might not be great so it could be a while before we can post another update!