Beside the occasional drug bust and abandoned meth house, ours is a fairly quiet place. The neighborhood is a mix of old and new construction. The houses behind ours are older homes with large, spacious backyards which are often the settings for loud, drunken social gatherings and forest fire-inducing bonfires. If you look at the grass in the southwest corner of our yard, you will see a small path leading from one fence to another. We call this the Kitty Highway and it is used by the neighborhood cats and trash pandas to get from point A to B.

In 2008, Forbes Magazine named the Rose City Park Neighborhood the 9th most overpriced neighborhood in the country. This comfortable neighborhood of mid-century homes plays host to plentiful bars, coffee shops, restaurants and a historic golf course. It is a warm and welcoming neighborhood to visit with plenty of iconic businesses and quirky finds.

If I were ever to write a gritty crime novel, I would set it in the Montavilla Neighborhood. Not because it’s scary, but because it’s very eccentric and very Portland. There are old classic houses proudly flying pride flags next to dilapidated crumbling homes with sheets for curtains. There are old apartment buildings that could easily be the setting for an intriguing crime novel where drug dealers, sex workers, flat broke college students (and an alcoholic P.I.) cohabitate together. Like a dirtier, sexier Tales of The City.

If Dr. Seuss were to design a neighborhood, it would be Piedmont. Each house my husband and I passed on our tour of this very walkable neighborhood was my new favorite.(Specifically in the Gainsboro Subdivision) There are hobbit homes, homes with turrets, bungalows, condos, homes where trolls probably live, homes for middle-aged goth children, factory workers and more.

Located east of the Willamette River, the Brooklyn Neighborhood snuggles up against Reed College and is home to popular attractions such as Edelweiss, Pok Pok Wings, Original Hotcake House and everyone’s favorite superfund site, Ross Island. Since most people know about those destinations, I’m not going spend any time on them, and instead feature some of the more interesting places worth a visit.

Not every museum is a showcase for grandiose works of art, or priceless artifacts. In fact, if you want to transition an item from mundane to extraordinary you only need to showcase it with some lights and a written history, and… POOF! You’ve got a museum. Portland is loaded with these gems!