Wednesday, June 04, 2008

Lots of Bird Books


On our first day in Portland, we visited the famous Powell's City of Books. This place is HUGE. They literally give you a map at the door. This is the bird book section shown here. They had TONS of awesome books including interesting local birding texts, world field guides, and many older books I have never seen. I spent quite a lot of time there looking through them and chatting with a local birder. I also got a kick out of their men's room where people had written every possible play-on-words on the word "grout" on the tile grout above the urinal. It included things like "grout it out loud," "grout at the devil," and tons of others.

Powell's also has a separate store in Portland that just sells technical books. I'm told there's a whole section of ornithological books there. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to see that store since I found out about the ornithology section after we had visited the area where it's located.

6 comments:

Rick Wright said...

Powell's in Chicago used to be _the_ place in North America for bird books published in Britain. It's easier nowadays, of course, but I still miss those shelves!
r

Anonymous said...

Holy cow, I would love to go there! I wish I knew somewhere in the Atlanta area like that.

Patrick B. said...

Rick, I didn't realize there was a Powell's in Chicago. The Portland one had many British books.

We're lucky to have a few NJ Audubon centers here in NJ with big bird book selections, but nothing like what I saw here!

Jennifer W. Hanson said...

That photo brings back happy memories. Then again, it's probably for the best (for my budget, anyway!) that Powell's is located a continent away from me. That place is book heaven.

dguzman said...

Oh man, to spend a day or two in such a bookstore--sigh.

Anonymous said...

Powell's is indeed book Mecca.