Cannabis Season – Week 11
This week includes: the Portland Pride Parade on Sunday; the June edition of Weed Industry Nights from the OCC; the Multnomah Falls Adventure from High5Tours; the Taste of Parkrose Festival as well as Bridge City Collective’s birthday party and the World Naked Bike Ride all on Saturday, as well as the continuation of my Dispensary Tour, continuing (completing?) my wander west of the Willamette River. Here is how I walked 39.7 miles from Sunday June 18 through Saturday, June 24.
Sunday, 6/18/17, 7.4 miles. Today is the Portland Pride Parade, and I am people watching at the river. To gain some exercise, I walk from Goose Hollow southeast along Columbia St. to 13th Ave, southwest along 13th to Montgomery St., then through PSU to Lovejoy Fountain Park and then to Tom McCall Waterfront Park. I am lucky enough to find a bench seat in the shade just outside the Pride Festival fence and sit there for a few hours enjoying the fact that I live in this amazing place.
Monday, 6/19/17, 7.1 miles.
Chalice – This will be the newest dispensary in the downtown area once they open. They are located at 823 SW Naito Parkway. The electrical system is being worked on today, and they already have the OLCC warning stickers on the glass door. I will keep an eye out for their grand opening in the near future.
Serra (SW First Ave) – If you will remember, this is one of the dispensaries on my list of Top 10 dispensaries in Portland, however today it is difficult to see why. The Pride Parade weekend has created a wonderful problem – the dispensary has sold out of many selections of vape cartridges, extracts, and some flower. Although there are only 25 chemovars (strains) on display, they are some of the better samples available.
Rose City Wellness (Old Town) LLC – This dispensary is also low on product (I am sensing a theme here ☹). They are the first dispensary I have seen with Cannaroma Cannaisseur Collection containing 10 terpenes specific for Jack Herer cannabis ($125). All prices are shown with tax (recreational pricing).
Cannabliss & Co. – On Burnside St. in the Alphabet District. There are 41 chemovars on the shelves, including three different Jager strains from 3 different farms (Epoch Farms, MillerVille Farms, and Cannabis Distribution). They show me some Snoops Dream (Orekron) at 18.6% THC, some AK Hash (MillerVille Farms) at 20.7% THC. They make their own ½ gram pre-rolls and offer them at $6. They offer $79 and $99 ounces (nice if you are considering creating edibles or extracts).
Oregon Weedery – located across the street from Salt & Straw on 23rd Ave, they are located on the second floor above a nail salon. Next to the dispensary is an area where they prepackage their flower (some in sealed envelopes) and make their pre-rolls. They have separate filtration areas in the dispensary and the work area, and they definitely work! I did not realize that they had so much flower on site, and it is totally because of the air filtration. There are 33 chemovars on the shelves, including Wedding Cake at 20.1% THC and Chem Cookies at 20.0% THC (both from Liontree Farms). This is a nice “boutique” dispensary. And they have a restroom available, with a sign on the door letting us all know that it is for “Whichever”. Love it!
Thurman Street Collective – unfortunately they have only 7 chemovars; fortunately they 1 gram pre-rolls from 10 different strains. This is also the first dispensary where I see prepackaged Who tins of 3 pre-rolls with matches ($28.80). What they lack in flower they more than make up in extract and edible choices.
Slabtown Cannabis Proprietors – Located in the industrial area of Nicolai St., this dispensary has reopened to the recreational market with 21 strains offered in 3 pricing groups ($10, $12, and $14 a gram). When asked to show me some of their product, I reviewed Conspiracy Kush, Lemon Meringue, and Sweet Meringue (all from Novik Farms). They also offer half-gram pre-rolls for $4.20, and have clones from the Ashland area, in south Oregon. This is a dispensary worth taking the time to check out.
Tuesday, 6/20/17, 1.2 miles. – Today I grocery shop and stay home with Flo, resting my feet.
Wednesday, 6/21/17, 7.0miles.
La Cannaisseur – As one drives north up NW St. Helens Rd, this dispensary is on the right at the traffic light at 107th Ave. (Linton, OR). The ordinary looking rectangular building belies the wonderfully eclectic interior (check out the huge chandelier!) and the fact that they have 39 different strains for our consideration. I discovered that they usually purchase entire harvests and store much of it in nitrogen gas to preserve it to sell over time. This allows us to purchase cannabis that was harvested over the past couple of years. They showed me some Charlotte’s Web and Nepalese Hash Plant from previous years’ harvests. They offer select ounces for $75 and have 1/8 ounces at $10 and ¼ ounces at $20. The budtenders here are all from medical dispensary backgrounds so they approach customers as patients and cannabis as medicine.
Tree PDX (Formerly Portland Medicine Pot) – also along NW St. Helens Road, this dispensary has quite a steep driveway. Today they have 20 chemovars on the shelves. They offer pre-packaged ounces ($50), quarters ($18), and eighths ($10) of “sugar trim bulk” for folks to use to make infused edibles and/or extracts, and/or pre-rolls. Today they are also offering EZ Grow Auto Flower clones for $48 each.
Vessel – this is another of the dispensaries on my list of Top 10 dispensaries in Portland, and another dispensary shy on product due to the Pride Parade. Today they have 16 strains on the shelf, including a Bruce Banner #3 at 27% THC. I will return in a couple of weeks when the next harvest will be ready for the shelves.
MindRite – this is another of the dispensaries on my list of Top 10 dispensaries in Portland, and today I count 37 chemovars on the shelf. They are too busy for me to spend much time with the budtenders. I will wander in here again when I check out the other downtown dispensaries in a couple of weeks.
Oregon’s Finest – it was great seeing that Josiah, a budtender with whom I spent some conversations at the Oregon’s Finest on MLK (on my list of Top 10 dispensaries) has now relocated to this dispensary in The Pearl district. There are 30 chemovars on the shelves, not including the pre-packaged “Last Chance” offerings that are usually available and, of course, change constantly. Two of the indica offerings that catch my attention are Oregon Diesel (Oregon Girl) at 16.6% and Zkittlez (Dharma Organic Gardens) at 24.4% THC.
Thursday, 6/22/17, 5.6 miles. – Today I get to help our good friend Rosie McGee with some chores around her house. After spending some quality time with her watching the Willamette River in the Milwaukie area, I wander to the North Warehouse to attend the Oregon Cannabis Concierge’s Weed Industry Night (thank you Josh Taylor!), featuring Whiskey Creek Farms and Firefly 2. Here I try out three strains from Whiskey Creek Farms (thank you David Pippenger!); Tourmaline, Grape Inferno, Ultra Orange. And, thanks to the folks from Firefly, we were all able to sample the flower using the Firefly 2 vaporizer. What a great opportunity for folks in the cannabis industry to be introduced to the folks behind the products as well as to the passion within those folks.
Friday, 6/23/17, 5.8 miles. – Today I tag along on a High5Tours Multnomah Falls Adventure. We begin on SE Main and head to Home Grown Apothecary to pick up some treats for the adventure. As we let someone else drive us east to Vista House we smoke a few samples of recently harvested cannabis. After a few minutes of sightseeing our wonderful driver takes us east along the Historic Columbia River Highway to Multnomah Falls, while we sample another treat or two. Once we have enjoyed the scenery and wandered around, we head back to Portland and are treated to a doughnut from Blue Star Doughnuts. Once the tour has completed, I wander to Rossi Farms and Fernhill Park to check out where I need to be tomorrow.
Saturday 6/24/17, 5.6 miles. – Today is Taste of Parkrose where I volunteer to sell Taste Tickets and Taste Armbands to attendees from 10am to 1pm. What a wonderful event! Next the bus takes me to Bridge City Collective on N. Williams Ave. where they are celebrating their 3rd anniversary. They have some fantastic deals on flower and extract at this sale; for $9 I get a gram of Real McCoy (High Noon Cultivation) which has a 31.45% THC test result. From here I take the bus to Fernhill Park where I sit at the Volunteer Check-in table at the World Naked Bike Ride. It takes a small army of volunteers (100+/-) to pull off this annual event. Even though the temperature rose to 101°, approximately 10,000 folks made their way to the park to get “as bare as you dare”. It always amazes me the costumes, lights, make-up, paints, and odd (interesting) mobility devices folks dream up for this FANTASTIC event!
