Portland greeted us with cloudy skies, which intermittently produced more or less steady rain.
We had just a couple hours to spare, so we walked around downtown and had an artery clogging lunch at Kenny and Zuke’s Deli.
Sadly, first impressions were weighed down by dark clouds and heavy lunch. I was almost ready to give up on sightseeing when we discovered the real jewel of Portland (well, arguably of course since it’s also known for it’s breweries, coffee, parks and roses): food carts. And not only just food carts, but absolutely astonishing amount of them. In less than 5 minutes, we encountered 3 lots full of food carts. They called “pods” in Portland.
The city allows to use empty parking lots or future construction sites to house pods. We walked by after lunch hour, but food carts were surrounded by bustling crowds and looked like lively beehives. According to Wikipedia, there are more than 600 licensed food carts in Portland. Back in 2010 CNN named Portland the best city in the world for street food. U.S. News & World Report followed with the same honor a year later. There is a website dedicated to ‘all things food carts’ with a detailed map for street food lovers.
Incidentally, we spotted this nice ad for Linux gurus. If you like great food and not a big fun of Microsoft just go to Portland.
