Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
has all the arcade games you either remember from your youth or wish
you'd had when you were a kid. The pinball collection alone is awe-
some. And they're all still cheap to play. There is also beer, and the
space occasionally serves as a live-music venue.
Around the corner to the left, the rest of this block is full of similarly
fun enterprises, including an imported-toy store and gallery, a coffee
shop-art gallery-music venue called Backspace, and an intimate music
lounge. Explore at your leisure.
At NW 5th Ave. turn right, then turn left on W. Burnside St. for a block.
At Burnside and NW 4th Ave. is the 38-foot-tall Chinatown Gate, in-
stalled in 1986; turn left on 4th to pass through it. As you do, take a look
across 4th Ave.; at the time of this writing, the corner block was occu-
pied (temporarily, it seems) by a very orderly homeless camp, walled in
on one side by a screen of artfully painted wooden doors along Burnside
St. The camp was set up by a nonprofit organization called Right 2
Dream Too (a sign out front explains all this), which is renting the space
from the landowner. It's unclear, however, what will become of the
camp if the owner succeeds in selling the land or finding a tenant.
At NW 4th Ave. and Couch St. is a good comic-book shop, Floating
World, and just beyond that is the oddball 24 Hour Church of Elvis,
which you really just have to experience to understand—but it's worth
the tiny detour, trust us: it's a very Portland thing. Kitty-corner from
Floating World is a beloved relic from a few years back, the enormous
neon sign for the long-departed Chinese restaurant Hung Far Low. (It's
okay if you can't keep a straight face.) Dedicated barflies adored Hung
Far Low for the minuscule corner bar, dark as night, with its tiny,
cheap, and powerful drinks, impassive bartenders, glowing Buddha
statue, and perilously long, narrow staircase that led up from the street.
When it closed (and moved to SE 82nd Ave., along with many of the
businesses that once made up historic Chinatown), a touchingly sincere
effort was made to preserve and keep displaying the Hung Far Low
sign. It worked. (Below the sign now is a fantastic pan-Asian restaurant
called Ping, worth a stop if you're at all hungry; it's co-owned by Andy
Ricker, the chef behind Pok Pok.)
Having turned right on Couch, turn right again on NW 3rd Ave., then
left on W. Burnside, left again on NW 2nd Ave., and then right to get
