Portland, a city of so much food and liquid deliciousness… but also the center of so much you can do. With the snowy peaks of Mt Hood only 1.5 hour away, you can make a day trip to the slopes for ski and snowboard the next day after fresh powder has accumulated. We went for snowshoe at Trillium Lake because well, if you can walk, you can snowshoe. Well, truthfully snowshoeing is a little bit different because the snowshoes mean you have to change the way you step slightly- which you will do naturally after a bit but definitely uses more muscles then normal walking. And the snowshoes, once you take them off at the end, you'll notice how much lighter your feet are and walk a little funny trying to recover back your normal walk.

We rented our snoeshoes, which came with poles, at Mountain Tracks, and you can get your Sno-Park daily pass there. You can also rent boots there if you have guests that don't have any because they come from sunny Los Angeles and asked you before they arrived in PDX if they should bring a coat.  Which yes, you should- a coat and layers because even though you warm up a lot to a point of sweating while snowshoeing, it was dropping to the teen temperatures that evening up at that altitude!

If you do Trillium Lake, try to reserve some energy for the last mile back to the Sno-Park- it's all uphill, not at a big incline but it definitely is very tiring at the end.

Unfortunately the day clouded over, so there was no view from Trillium Lake that showed Mt Hood. But, it was still beautiful.