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How we got to Corvallis

By
Real Estate Agent with Town & Country Realty

Last week I gave a brief description of Corvallis and a few of it's highlights.  Let me back up and tell you what I have to compare Corvallis with.  I grew up in a tiny town in Wisconsin.  Bloomer, WI (pop. 3,300) was where I called home from the ages of 5-21.  It was a typical small farm town in the Midwest.  Everyone new what everyone else was doing, and whose kids were running around causing trouble and everything else.  From there I went to UW Stout in Menomonie, WI.  A whopping 45 minutes from my home town and a much bigger city at 15,000, including students.  Stout had roughly 7,000 students when I was there.  Not a very big school.  I was lucky enough to meet my wife there, and we moved back to her hometown in NE Iowa upon graduating.  A town of roughly 9,000 people is where we thought we would spend the rest of our days.  There we opened a bookstore and coffee shop, and purchased an existing liquor store.  Wanting a little more opportunity for our children and sick of the extreme climates, we decided to look into moving.  Through process of elimination, not wanting humidity or much snow, we decided the state of Oregon offered what we were looking for.

 

We picked four cities to investigate; Salem, Eugene, Medford, & Corvallis.  Keeping it very secret, we told our friends we were going to visit wine country in Washington and Oregon.  We had eliminated Salem and Eugene due to the size of the cities.  We took a week and visited Corvallis and Medford.  We were leaning towards Medford pre-trip since it was in southern Oregon and would have warmer year round temperatures, but was located next to nothing.  Corvallis had the State University, was nicely located close to the coast, the mountains, and Portland.  Living an hour and a half from an international airport is nice.

 

Upon our arrival to Corvallis, which was later in the evening on a Monday, we were happy to find a Ruby Tuesday close to the hotel and still open.  The next day our Realtor took us around to some neighborhoods we were interested in and showed us a few houses.  She then took us to Corvallis Country Club, which would be an important part of our social and recreational lives, and weigh heavy on our decision.  We must have been there for almost an hour.  We were talking to the pro shop staff, which were very extremely friendly, and the general manager went out of his way to make us feel welcome and ran to get us a membership packet.  We had lunch at a wonderful restaurant called Big River.  Finding Big River showed off Corvallis' wonderful downtown, the most scenic part was located next to the Willamette River, and the beautiful River Walk area was recently redone and is home to many great restaurants, brew pubs, and shops.  More on that to come.

 

The next day we took the three hour drive down highway 5 to Medford.  To make the story a little shorter, and to get back to why we chose Corvallis, Medford was not cool.  People were nowhere near as nice, the city was not easy to get around, and we generally didn't like it.  We had planned on spending two nights there, but my wife and I were both in agreement that Corvallis felt more like home, so we cut the trip to Medford short, and spent the extra night in Corvallis.

 

By the way, it wasn't the weather on that trip last October (2010), it rained the whole time we here.  But we didn't care, if we were going to consider living in Corvallis, we better get used to the rain.  When we got into town, I saw something while cruising downtown that interested me, a brew pub.  After driving to Medford and back in two days, I was ready for a beer.  The brew pub we went to that night was Flat Tail Brewing.  What a great place, I can say I have been back several times since moving here, and would call it my favorite hangout bar.  I am able to keep up on my beloved Green Bay Packers here, which also makes me happy.  Flat Tail is not the only brew pub, Block 15 and McMennamin's are two other great places to enjoy a beer and great pub food.

 

We didn't move here just for the brew pubs, I promise.  Everywhere we went, every place we ate, every business we went into, we were treated like family.  We couldn't believe how nice everyone was everywhere we went.  After the few days we visited Corvallis, it all clicked.  Corvallis was huge (for us, remember we were from super small towns) but it had a small town feel to it.  As I have been here since April, I am able to say Corvallis has the comfortableness of the Midwest towns we grew up in, with the amenities of a bigger city.  We love it here, our kids have blended well, just last night the boys went trick or treating with a bunch of their new friends.  Although I miss my friends in Iowa, I am happy we made the move. Corvallis is a truly special place, and I am happy to be here.

 

I will be updating this blog weekly with stories of our discovery of Corvallis.  If you are thinking of moving to Corvallis and need real estate assistance, please visit my website, I would love to share the experience.

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