About Sleeping Around the Northwest

About this site

I've always been enamored of hotels, inns and cottages, thanks to a mother who preferred such things to camping. Much to my parents’ amusement, on my first hotel elevator ride in Seattle at age five, I asked the attendant, “Are you taking us to our cabin?” I know the difference now and since returning home to Oregon from another life writing for television in Los Angeles, I have been roaming the Pacific Northwest writing about food, lodging and fun stuff.

As luck would have it, I inherited the guidebook, Best Places to Stay—Pacific Northwest, from Marilyn McFarland, whose gracious reviews taught me to perhaps be more kind than is my natural instinct.

My requirements for inclusion are simple: places I love. I have personally visited every one, so expect real information with a singular point of view. I love lodging from funky cabins to luxury hotels and will not generally list chain hotels or motels. With savvy designs, rich colors, sumptuous linens, and attention to detail, my favorite inns transcend a conventional B&B experience. (Lacy frou-frou, artificial flowers, perfumed candles, profuse floral patterns and teddy bear collections are fine and dandy, but you won’t find them here).

If you find cloying décor, spotty service, not-so great linens, etc. there will be outstanding reasons for overlooking them.

Just so you know:
The Archives have personal traveling tales & Finds is stuff I like, just for fun.

My blog http://mjsleeps.wordpress.com will be updated as I get the urge.

Please send me a note at mj@sleeparoundnw.com if you find things amiss (or want to share great finds!) I will be updating continually and comments are greatly appreciated.

So, pack those bags and get out there. Who knows, we may run into each other.

Happy travels!
M.J. Cody

Each location has my personal recomendations on the best places to
EAT STAY & PLAY

Occasionally I include a Fair Warning

All photographs on this site were taken by me, unless otherwise credited.

DISCLAIMER (sure, I have to do this): Restaurants, sites and lodging fluctuate, so I can’t guarantee that things will be exactly as described. Also, I can’t be responsible if you choose to bike off a mountaintop, sprain an ankle, get food poisoning or drown. Use this site at your own risk.

About me

A short bio in the third person.

MJ Cody is co-editor with Mike Houck of the acclaimed Wild in the City, A Guide to Portland's Natural Areas (Oregon Historical Society), author of Our Portland, a coffee table style book with photographer Rick Schafer (Voyageur Press), and the editor of Best Places to Stay—Pacific Northwest (6th edition, Houghton Mifflin).

An Oregon native, MJ spent many years in Los Angeles where she was the photo editor of The L.A. Weekly and an award-winning Art Director for Flowers&, a TeleFlora Corporation magazine. Before returning to Oregon, MJ wrote for television’s “Major Dad,” and was Story Editor on “Mama’s Family,” and “Knots Landing,” for which she won the Soap Opera Award for “Best Storyline” two consecutive years.

MJ’s regular column, “Sleeping Around the Northwest,” appears in the Sunday Oregonian Travel section replacing her former column, “Wingin’ It.” She has contributed features to The Oregonian, NW Palate Magazine, Horizon Air, Audubon Magazine, Travel Oregon, and other publications. MJ has researched, written, and produced two audio driving tour CDs, “The Barlow Road” and “A Feast for the Senses” and written TeleTales heritage narratives for Oregon’s Mt. Hood Territory (Clackamas County Tourism and Development). In 2008 she received Oregon’s Mt. Hood Territory Chairman’s Award.

MJ is a member of the Clackamas County Cultural Coalition and serves on the boards of Jacknife-Zion-Horseheaven Historical Society (Eagle Creek, Estacada, Springwater areas), Friends of Clyde Rice literary group and is Chair of Urban Greenspaces Institute in Portland.

She currently is working on the second edition of Wild in the City and is happy to be sleeping around her home territory.