DAY ELEVEN
At first glance, the itinerary for day eleven was fairly nondescript. Much of our time was simply travelling on the interstate highway from Olympia, WA to Portland, OR, and there was nothing particularly remarkable about the journey itself.
But there was something at the end of our travels that was anything but ordinary.
This is the day we encountered DECO DREAM.
By this point in the trip, we had stayed in quite a few Airbnb places, and this is definitely one of the very best. There are so many incredible details throughout — from the Art Deco design work through to the fibre optic lighting — that you never run out of things to see and explore. Built by Paul Wenner (the inventor of the ‘garden burger’), it was inspired by the 1980s Art-Deco revival and is wonderfully unconventional. There are plenty of ‘quirky’ places on Airbnb but this one stands out as genuinely unique.
We also loved the location — a quiet residential street only minutes away from loads of great bars, shops and cafes on Hawthorne and Belmont.
That evening, we went for a meal and drinks in the prohibition themed bar Circa 33. While we were a little disappointed that the secret speakeasy room was closed (we had read online that you access it with a code hidden inside a book on the library shelf) it was still a really cool bar that served up tasty Fish Tacos and 1930s themed cocktails.
We didn’t stay too long, though, as we wanted to make it back to spend more time in the Deco Dream. I mean, how often do you get to stay in an art-deco mansion built in the 1980s that manages to mix the best (and worst) of those two eras?
We were also pleased that we made it back in time to say goodnight to the ‘Pega-Corn’ — a neon lit half Pegasus, half Unicorn built for the Burning Man festival — that our host David had set up in the back patio.
It was everything we could have wanted from a first taste of Portland.
