Bike Around Portland Oregon: Bridges, Neighborhoods, Poetry and Roses

We will get you fitted for a bike and helmet at Around Portland Tours' shop at 833 SE Main Street #121, and head out to the streets of Portland for a slow-paced ride through the inner Southeast Portland neighborhoods. We'll ride into the Hawthorne District, past one of the original food cart pods, and one of the newest.

After taking off from the shop, we'll ride into Ladd's Addition, a pretty neighborhood designed in a labyrinth style, and visit one of the many rose gardens there.

The Clinton Street greenway is part of our experience, and we stop to show off one of the original streetcar stops and our favorite spot (in times when the theater is open) to see funky, artsy, and cult movies.

We'll ride the bike path along the Orange line of the MAX light rail, which has a variety of beautiful art pieces, from word play along concrete barriers and in the sidewalks, to the gorgeous mural by Irish street artist Fin DAC -- a mural that must be seen to be fully appreciated!

Our favorite bridge to ride across is the Tilikum Crossing, one of the most unusual bridges in a city focused around its Willamette River crossings! We'll take the slow route onto the bridge, get counted by the device that monitors the number of cyclists to cross each day and each year, and stop for photos and some history on Portland's newest bridge, and the only one like it in the world.

From the Tilikum Crossing we'll head to the South Waterfront neighborhood, past the docking for the Aerial Tram, Portland's newest mode of transportation, and learn why we have this beautiful bullet-shaped transport -- and how much, exactly, it cost us.

BLUE STAR CURRENTLY OPEN LIMITED DAYS/HOURS. We will stop at another doughnut shop, pastry shop or ice cream if they are closed.

One of our favorite hidden river spaces, the South Waterfront Greenway is one of the many links in the city's amazing river access.

We could wax eloquent about Poet's Beach forever! This little sandy beach was created by the Human Access Project, a program that seeks to connect us more tangibly to the river, so we take better care of it. What’s more, the poetry along the beach, written by local students, captures our hearts and minds.

We'll head down the Willamette River, passing one of the most interesting housing and retail developments from the 1980s, and learn how this project attempted to change the course of urban design.

We'll ride through the Tom McCall Waterfront Park, and learn how what it *used* to be changed Portland in a big way; and how our reluctantly hippie governor in the early 1970s changed it back.

We'll ride under the Hawthorne Bridge, and learn why this iconic structure might go up and down, with no big ship underneath it.