Sept. 21, 2010

Guess who JIm and I found in Portland this morning?  On our way to the Oregon Historical Society we found Abraham Lincoln.  Apparently the city erected the statue in 2009 to commemorate his birthday.  It's located in a wonderful green park that runs for many city blocks in the cultural district of downtown.

Since the glorious sun shone on Portland today, we took advantage of it!  We started at the Oregon Historical society, which was a good and succinct history of the founding and development of the state.  One fun bit of information was how the city of Portland got its name.  Two men, one from Boston, MA, and one from Portland, Maine, came west to make their fortunes and were founding fathers of Portland.  They each wanted to name the emerging city after their own home town, so they flipped a coin and the man from Maine won!  Things happen for the most amazing reasons, huh?

From the historical Society we made our way on the Portland subway system, which is very nice, to the Lan Su Chinese Garden.  This is an incredible garden that is a must-see for anyone traveling here.  I hope my pictures give an idea of how graceful and beautiful it is.

Reflected city in Lan Su Garden

Window view

Rock in landscaping

Floor patterns made from stones

Tea House 

Our tea

Lan Su has only been in existence since 2000!  Most of the materials to build it were brought from China, and artisans came to assemble it.  It's considered the most authentic Chinese garden outside of China, and it's based on what a wealthy government worker/scholar's home would have looked like during the 16th century.  It is worth seeing!

From there we went to the World Forestry Center in Washington Park, an urban park bigger than Central Park!  The Center is a hands on  educational museum about forests.  We enjoyed it and learned that neither of us had the skill to use heavy equipment (or even an ax, I would wager) to chop down a tree.  You could sit in a tree harvester simulator and try your hand at chopping down a forest.  Jim said he probably destroyed at least a million dollars worth of equipment.  I couldn't even get the "cutter" off of the ground ... pitiful!