Quote:
Originally Posted by tevake
Timely thread for me. I loved my time in the PNW last year. And have been watching R E listings since
I'm realy drawn to Port Townsend , and wonder about the Hood Canal area.
I have little interest in the interior as the moderate coastal weather is what makes the area possible for me
Most folks leaving the PNW site the gloom and drizzle as a reason. This makes the northern peninsula area seem like a good choice.
Resent weather checks here in Prescott Az and in the areas of interest to me there, temps are about the same.
I think this is all adding up to an extended vist in the near future. Nothing like being there to sus out the feel
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Port Townsend is a small, artsy, very scenic, kinda hippie, rather isolated, and I repeat, small town that is a popular retirement and weekend place for Seattlelites. I have friends who have lived there for a long time and I've been there a lot. Great place to visit. Cool wooden boat facilities. Cute main street by the water, about six blocks long, also a bitty commercial area uptown. Weather sucks in the winter, cold, windy, rainy.. (Not sure where people get the idea that area has better weather than the rest of western PNW?) People are either well off older retirees and weekenders, or locals barely scraping by on seasonal service jobs. Young people get the hell out as soon as they can . . . but they might come back. There are all of the bssic stores and services you need (food, hardware, auto parts, one movie theatre, a good bookstore, etc) but maybe not what you want (flyshop, RC hobby, ballet, german car mechanic, etc . . . not gonna be one, at least not any good). No hospital nearby. The above is pretty much descriptive of any small touristy town.
I also know the Yakima area well enough. Wife is from there, I've been a lot. Really hot in summer, cold and some snow in winter, not rainy. Mix of rural white low income, Mexican farmworkers or their descendants, small town white low income, and the local successfuls who are mostly small business owners. Not a lot of the higher income employee type, there isn't much of that kind of work in the city. General education level is low. The politics are conservative. Has lots of big box retail and strip malls, the interesting quirky retail is possibly smaller in number than Port Townsend. No good bookstore, really not much art or culture of any sort. Downtown Yakima is a ghost town, killed by the huge downtown indoor mall. That mall is a ghost town, killed by the owner being a total ******* and driving business after business out. So the real retail activity has moved to Union Gap. Some really beautiful country outside of town - the Gorge, Lake Chelan, etc. Several small towns around, Moses Lake and Tieton and so on, if you want really cheap property. There are hospitals but the medical care is bad, everyone with money goes to Seattle for any major procedure. Not a thriving economy.
I would live in Port Townsend, ideally for only part of the year. I would not live in Yakima.
If you want PNW but sunny i.e. East of the Cascades, then check out Boise or Spokane.
I would also look at Eugene, it is partly a college town, and growing. Still laidback. Enough culture and medical. Probably some investment potential. Any house within 1/2 mile of UO can be rented for $600/bedroom, and plenty of them are 4 bedrooms. As Portland gets expensive, folks are looking at Eugene.