In Portland, the city is divided into quadrants, from the river that runs north and south, and a highway that runs east and west. So to know where things are, all addresses are have a SW, NW, SE, NE before the street name. Each quadrant is cool, and has fun neighborhoods. The NW and SW is definitely hilly, where as the east side is more flat, save for a couple of parks on hills.
We live on the SW side, on a busy street unfortunately. The rental housing market is hot here, so we had a tough time finding a rental (still own in Chicago - sigh). Now there are things about Portland that's "off" and if you watch the show Portlandia on IFC, according to our friends, it's true to life. And yes, we agree being newbies to the area. One weird thing in our SW area, is there are no sidewalks. It's sooooooo bizarre. But our saving grace is a huge park only 1/2 mile down the street. It's great. It has two dog parks, tennis courts, a gym on the corner that we've joined, baseball fields, playgrounds, etc PLUS this awesome hilly, forestry area with a stream and hiking paths. Sully goes everyday.
Here is a camera phone photo from one of the high points in the park on the field where Sully gets his run on. It's great! Well....minus the slugs in the forest.... BARF
And I kid you not, this disgusting thing was a good 4 inches long. Unfortunately, I've seen bigger in a larger nature park on trails with Sully, where I felt like I was playing Frogger on Atari, except I was dodging stepping on slugs instead of getting squished by cars. Eww. (Shudder)
UPDATE:
This is the disgustingness I'm talking about........next to a size 8.5 women's shoe.....from yesterday.
