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While we could rave infinitely about a Portland to-do list, we’ll keep our recommendations concentrated to the Northwest sector of the city.

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📚ADDING TO YOUR TBR LIST?📚
While Powell’s is a given anywhere in Portland (including northwest), we also love the used bookshop Daedalus. (Bonus points: Take your new book from Daedalus to Ken’s Artisan Bakery and read the first few pages over a pastry and cappuccino).


🍺CRAVING A GUINNESS POUR & PROPER PUB?🍺
Go to Kell’s. And if you do, tell us — we’re on our way.


🌲ACHING TO GET OUTSIDE?🌲
Portland has no shortage of city-adjacent trails, but our favorites are in Forest Park. Try the Lower Macleay Trail to traipse along the water and see the Witch’s castle, and if you want to keep going, you can march yourself all the way up to Pittock Mansion for views of the city (or drive there, we don’t care).


🍕HUNTING FOR PIZZA?🍕
Look no further than Escape from New York – Portland’s first by-the-slice pizza shop (no worries, you can get whole pies, too).


🥞SITTING DOWN FOR BRUNCH?🥞
We simply have to send you to Stepping Stone Cafe for the proper Justin-and-Julea brunch experience. (Runner up: Fuller’s Coffee Shop)


🐾GETTING A SOUVENIR FOR YOUR PUP?🐾
Bean insists you check out her pet store and “barkery,” Hip Hound on 23rd.


🎱PRACTICING BILLIARDS?🎱
For a cheap pint of Hamm’s and patio pool tables (what better way to spend an August weekend?), meet up at Paymaster Lounge.


🧪NERDING OUT?🧪 (us, too)
This isn’t in NW Portland, but you should check out OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry, but everyone calls it OMSI) for some hands-on learning and fun.

🍫NEEDING SOMETHING SWEET?🍫
Head up to the St. Johns neighborhood of Portland, and check out Bees & Beans — where Julea works during the week — for an incredible selection of candy sweetened with honey and made with local ingredients. While you're there, pop next door to Wonderwood Springs (where Julea also works) to see an epic cafe or mini-golf course that's created as an immersive fantasy world art installation. If you've got some time in your schedule, you won't regret at St. Johns excursion!

This time, we’re visiting, too. As such, I can admit this list is much less impressive than above.

While I (Julea) grew up in and around Murfreesboro, everything looks SO different every time I come back to visit. To further prove my lack of qualifications, I haven’t spent much of my adult life here, so I admittedly don’t know what’s cool anymore.

However, I do know the Murfreesboro classics of my youth — irony aside:

🛍️Shop till ya drop at the Avenue (literally every chain store you can imagine and then some)(and food, too.)

🍝I don’t know how to explain this, but Demos’ also feels like a Murfreesboro icon. I’m writing this, and I don’t know if it’s open anymore, but consider my fingers crossed — I’ve been craving that cheesy bread.

🌳 Run, walk and cycle along the Stones River Greenway.

🥞 Rumor has it I worked at Cracker Barrel for a week in Summer 2021 (the rumor is true). Rumor also has it that it’s still the best place for a down-home southern meal (that rumor is also true, unfortunately).

🧠 Looking for a fun fact or bragging rights? Murfreesboro is also home to the Geographic Midpoint of Tennessee. Go check it out — take a photo with it if you need to.

🍦I’m sure there’s a better, or more local, spot for ice cream and chilled sweet treats but Andy’s is so hard for me to pass up. Bonus points? There’s a location just down the street from my parents’ house where we’ll all be September 20th (dangerous!).

📚This isn’t in Murfreesboro, but one spot I frequent every time I’m in Nashville is McKAY’s, the used bookstore. DROOL.

This is the best I’ve got for now. And maybe ever.