Flyby of Mount Hood

On our descent down to PDX, the pilot took us close to Mount Hood. I also got a picture of the other mountains in the distance behind Mount Hood.

We went to a few gardens in Portland: Lan Su Chinese Garden, Rose Garden, Japanese Garden

Lan Su Chinese Garden

Our first stop was the Chinese Garden in Chinatown.

There was an admission fee but there was also a student discount. I carry my BU ID everywhere so I got a few dollars off.

Above was a small house that had a video on making tea and how to seep it properly.

There was a small tea house inside. We had a cup of tea each and the water was refilled a few times so we had more than a few cups of tea per person.

We were kicked out shortly before the garden closed at 5pm. I managed to get some last minute pictures of the garden before leaving.

International Rose Test Garden

The next day, we went to the Arboretum. Afterwards, we went to the Rose Garden.

This was an open garden in the same area as the Arboretum. This was free to visit but parking nearby can be difficult as it has the same parking area as the Japanese Garden. Parking in this area was free. There wasn’t much of a parking lot there so it can be busy during the summer. Even on a nice day in October parking was hard to find.

There were a few different rose associations that used this space to showcase past winning roses and also experiment with new rose types. Many of the roses were very nice.

I was getting some practice on these gorgeous roses here. I can’t wait to get a full frame DSLR!

Japanese Garden

This required a fee to get in. The garden sits on top of the hill so you would have to walk up the path on a out and back trail. There was also a free shuttle bus from the base of the hill to the top every 15 minutes. We waited for the shuttle on the way up and on the way down, the bus was about to leave.

The tour guide walked us through various sections of the garden. Each area was specifically designed so it is very interesting to see a garden like this.

This was the first tea house we saw on our route. There was another smaller one later in the tour. They host tea ceremonies here once a month and you can participate in it as well! They give you the traditional garments to change into.

We walked by one of the coi ponds. This had the most fish while others only had a few.

These last two areas were really interesting. A pattern is made in a field of small rocks. It has to be remade when they walk through to clean the leaves. They usually clean it once a week during the summer, and a few times a week in the fall.

There was a ceramics exhibit here in the Japanese Garden. All of it looked amazing.

On the other side of the ceramic exhibit was another area with a rock display. This was much bigger than the first one on the tour.

As it was fall in Portland, there were many trees that were brilliant in color. When I was landing at PDX, i could see bright red maple trees dotting the neighborhoods below. I have never seen such a bright red color before! It is very nice that it dots the different neighborhoods around Portland.