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Tourism in Portland, Oregon

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Tourism in Portland, Oregon

The Portland metropolitan area in the U.S. states of Oregon and Washington has a variety of tourist attractions.

Contents

Map of Portland, OR, USA

In 2016, Portland area tourism generated $5.1 billion in direct spending by 8.99 million overnight person-trips and employs 36,100 people who were paid $1.27 billion.

The most recommended attractions by guide books include:

  • Forest Park
  • Waterfront Park
  • Lan Su Chinese Garden
  • Portland Art Museum
  • Portland Saturday Market
  • Portland Farmers Market
  • Washington Park
  • International Rose Test Garden
  • Japanese Garden
  • Columbia River Gorge NSA
  • Pittock Mansion
  • Waterfront Park
  • Powell's
  • OMSI
  • Oregon Zoo
  • Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden
  • Food carts
  • Neighborhoods of Hawthorne, Mississippi, and Alberta
  • Microbreweries
  • Bicycling

    • Cultural

  • 24 Hour Church of Elvis, exhibit and museum (closed in 2013)
  • Blue Sky Gallery, exhibits and archives for local and national photographers
  • Klickitat Street, home of fictional characters Henry Huggins, Ramona Quimby and Beatrice "Beezus" Quimby in the children's book series by Beverly Cleary; a sculpture garden is on NE 37th
  • Museum of Contemporary Craft, oldest continuously-running craft institution in the U.S. exhibiting local and international artists' work
  • Northwest Film Center, film and video exhibition, film making arts education, and public information programs; sponsors the Portland International Film Festival, Northwest Filmmakers' Festival, Reel Music Film Festival, Portland Jewish Film Festival, and the Young People's Film Festival.
  • Portland Art Museum, oldest art museum on the West Coast, seventh oldest in the United States, more than 42,000 permanent works of art, and at least one major traveling exhibition, Native American art, Northwest art, modern and contemporary art, Asian art, and an outdoor public sculpture garden
  • Portland Institute for Contemporary Art, contemporary performance and visual arts programming, including the Time-Based Art Festival each September
  • Portlandia, second-largest copper repoussé statue in the U.S., after the Statue of Liberty
  • Powell's Books, claims to be the largest independent new and used bookstore in the world at 68,000 square feet (6,300 m2), about 1.6 acres of retail floor space
  • Voodoo Doughnut, unusual doughnuts, eclectic decor, iconic pink boxes with drawings of voodoo priests, legal wedding services with catered receptions

    • Nightclubs

  • Cotton Club, 1960s Soul Music venue
  • Crystal Ballroom, 1914 ballroom with floating floor; since the 1960s, a dance and concert venue
  • Dante's, live contemporary music venue
  • Ground Kontrol, bar and one of the best video arcades in the U.S.
  • La Luna, prominent with the emergence of Grunge music in the 1990s; formerly named Ninth Street Exit (1970s), and Pine Street Theater (1980–1986)
  • Satyricon nightclub, alternative rock venue 1983–2003, closed 2010
  • X-Ray Cafe, one of the best rock and roll clubs in the country 1990 to 1994, prominent in Portland's underground culture

    • Events

  • Hood to Coast relay race, late August team charity fundraising race, among longest major relays and the largest with 20,000+ participants, 322 kilometres (200 mi) course from Timberline Lodge to Seaside on the Oregon Coast
  • Mt. Hood Jazz Festival, mid-August
  • Oregon International Air Show, largest civilian air show on the U.S. West Coast, held July or August
  • Portland Farmers Market, weekly outdoor market, one of the five best farmers markets in the U.S., mid-March through December
  • Portland International Auto Show, held in January
  • Portland Marathon, the first weekend of October attracts about 10,000 participants, most from out of the area with the highest proportion of women of U.S. marathons (58% in 2007); a third of finishers are walking participants.
  • Portland Rose Festival, June civic festival with hundreds of events including the second largest all-floral parade in the U.S.
  • Portland Saturday Market, outdoor arts and crafts market, largest continuously operated outdoor market in the U.S., weekends March through Christmas
  • Waterfront Blues Festival, charity fundraiser for Oregon Food Bank, first weekend in July, 150 performances on four stages
  • Portland Urban Iditarod, team event through downtown Portland which emphasizes unique themes and costumes on the first Saturday in March

    • Golf

  • Meriwether National Golf Course
  • Portland Golf Club
  • Pumpkin Ridge Golf Club
  • The Reserve Vineyards & Golf Club

    • Historical

  • Fort Vancouver National Historic Site
  • Horse rings, horse tie-ups embedded in curbs since at least 1900
  • Oregon Historical Society Museum
  • Oregon Holocaust Memorial
  • Oregon Korean War Memorial
  • Oregon Vietnam Veterans Memorial
  • Pittock Mansion
  • Shanghai tunnels
  • USS Blueback (SS-581) naval submarine tour
  • Washington County Museum

    • Parks and gardens

  • Crystal Springs Rhododendron Garden, more than 2,500 rhododendrons and azaleas surrounded by small lakes, fountains, and small waterfalls
  • Elk Rock Gardens of the Bishop's Close, 13-acre estate with Magnolias, native, and non-native trees and shrubs
  • Forest Park, among the largest of city parks
  • The Grotto
  • Hoyt Arboretum, 187-acre hosts nearly ten thousand individual trees and shrubs of more than eleven hundred species with about 12 miles of trail
  • International Rose Test Garden, more than 7,000 plants of more than 500 varieties on 4.5 scenic acres
  • Lan Su Chinese Garden
  • Leach Botanical Garden
  • Mill Ends Park, world's smallest
  • Mount Tabor, an extinct or dormant volcano with a 200-acre city park on the summit
  • Oaks Amusement Park
  • Pioneer Courthouse Square
  • Portland Japanese Garden
  • Tom McCall Waterfront Park
  • Washington Park

    • Science, technology and education

  • Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum
  • Oregon Museum of Science and Industry (OMSI)
  • Oregon Rail Heritage Center
  • Oregon Zoo
  • Portland Aquarium
  • Portland Children's Museum
  • Rice Northwest Museum of Rocks and Minerals
  • World Forestry Center

    • Shopping

  • Cascade Station
  • Jantzen Beach Center
  • Lloyd Center
  • Mall 205
  • Pioneer Place
  • Portland Saturday Market
  • Washington Square

    • Other

  • Audubon Society of Portland
  • Burnside Skatepark
  • Oregon Sports Hall of Fame
  • Portland Aerial Tram
  • Portland Vintage Trolley (recently discontinued)
  • Washington Park and Zoo Railway
  • Willamette Shore Trolley

    • Portland bridges

  • Interstate Bridge
  • St. Johns Bridge
  • Fremont Bridge
  • Broadway Bridge
  • Steel Bridge
  • Burnside Bridge
  • Morrison Bridge
  • Hawthorne Bridge
  • Marquam Bridge
  • Tilikum Crossing
  • Ross Island Bridge
  • Sellwood Bridge

    • References

    Tourism in Portland, Oregon Wikipedia
    (Text) CC BY-SA