A reinvented logging town populated by skateboarding students, Cali refugees, and athletes-in-training (all of whom care deeply about what they eat and where it comes from—the closer, the better), Bend is seeing a post-downturn recovery spurred by locavore dining and nouveau food carts.
Your day should start with a farm-fresh scramble from Chow. Lunch favorites are Jackson’s Corner, for cut-above-average sandwiches; and Spork, a food-truck-turned-restaurant that serves green Thai curry and tacos. When the dinner bell sounds, great choices are Zydeco, for New Orleans–tinged flavors; 900 Wall, whose ordinary-seeming pasta/pizza/steak menu belies a real talent; and Joolz, for a uniquely Oregonian take on Lebanese food (like Hummus on the Range: seared elk meat with your hummus and pita).
Slopes: Just 22 miles west, rising out of the Deschutes National Forest, is solitary Mt. Bachelor (from $92). It’s a challenging ski area: 4300 acres of exhilarating, windswept runs with a 3,365-foot vertical drop.
Sleeps: The boutiquey Oxford Hotel (from $289) puts you in the heart of downtown’s buzzy small-plates scene—and one of the stars is the hotel’s own 10 Below restaurant.
Info: 17 miles from Redmond Municipal Airport; bendchamber.org
More: Find the best in Bend