Oregon City Rambles

I had fairly ambitious plans for the summer—I was going to take the babe and do all kinds of exploring of the “new territory”. It’s a shame then, that I spent so much of the first trimester feeling like crap. I missed out on a glorious season for wandering around and exploring our nearby sister city across the river—Oregon City.

When I lived in Portland, I did not even know Oregon City existed. That’s a common enough consequence of living in a place like Portland, where there’s not much incentive to go anywhere else. I probably lived there for 4 or 5 years before I know where Oregon City was, much less that there was a reason to go there.

In the summer, we took the free trolley that goes through Oregon City, and discovered all kinds of things to check out later. A trolley ride, in and of itself is fairly entertaining for a toddler, but I’ve always wanted to come back and just walk around the city more.

Now that I live out in Clackamas County, and have a toddler who needs entertainment, fresh air, and exercise, I’m starting to appreciate the possibilities presented by the small towns around here. Quite unlike places like Beaverton, Hillsboro, or Happy Valley, that are all “NEW”, these older river towns like Gladstone and Oregon City are all built on a much smaller scale, so they’re much more walkable, and make for good pedestrian adventures. Conceived of and built in the days long before automobiles ruled supreme, these two towns have great parks, low speed limits, compact “main street” style downtowns, and lots of sightseeing in manageable sized areas.