Opportunity might come up, what am I getting myself into?!

It is hard to tell what the geography is in that area on Google Earth. From Portland to the coast, is it flat?

Weather? Hopefully more winter than Boise. Closest place to Snowboard?

Traffic compared to other major cities?

Could we live in the woods on the other side of Portland and commute across every day in an hour? Would like to have a house in a woodsy area, or coastal if possible. Hour'ish max travel time.

Thanks in advance!

Eta: Can I at least pump my own gas on a motorcycle?

-- They will hand you the pump, then your good to go.

Interesting... Thanks for the input.

If the jobs in north plains you could definitely live way west and commute easily. You'll get less winter than Boise. Snowboarding is Mt Hood which is east a ways.

Traffic is much worse than Boise. Plan accordingly.

Housing prices are the suck right now.  Super high and very high demand.  Not sure what it is like in Northplains, but just a bit south of there in Forest Grove it is currently insane.   IF you want to live in the woods, I hope you are independently wealthy.  It ain't cheap to buy a house in the trees, unless your standards are very low or you don't mind being waaaaaaay out in the middle of nowhere.  Depending on where in the Portland you will be working, you might look at Scappoose or St Helens.  Both are a bit cheaper to live in, but are just a short trip up Hwy 30 to get into Portland.  And traffic is usually never terrible on 30.  I will say that the Hour commute into Portland sucks after a while.  I have lived in the Hillsboro area most of my life and had a job out by the Portland Airport and that commute sucked.  If you are going to have a job on the east side of portland, look in Clackamas county or out by Corbett/troutdale/sandy.  Lots of pretty trees and such and housing can be a bit cheaper in some of those places as well.  You'd be 45min further from the coast, but you'd only be an hr from the Mountain.

Weather is rainy most of the fall through spring.  We get a little snow in the winter, maybe 2 days worth but nothing great.  Summer is about on par with N. Idaho, maybe a little cooler because of the close proximity to the coast.  

Terrain around N. Plains is hilly.  It's just about at the foothills of the coast range, so it's not terribly flat.  It is in a bit of a valley though.  It's less than 15min from the coast range itself so it is easy to get out of town and into the woods.  NP is a very small town, but you are like 8-10min from all the shops and crap in Hillsboro/Beaverton, and about 10-15min more from all the douchebaggery you can handle in Portland.  Traffic on the Westside is ok.  Usual rush hour BS but it's rarely ever gridlock.  Lots of rubber neckers and idiots from California that have no clue how to drive when it is anything but sunny out.  The only places that traffic is usually crap are 217, and I5 near the bridge into WA.  The rest are usually ok for the most part.  They have their ups and downs.  Compared to Seattle, Portland traffic is nothing.  

Closest place to board in up on Hood (a 2hr drive from the westside of Portland).  There are 3 main places.  Ski Bowl, Timberline, and Mt Hood Meadows.  I like meadows the best for terrain.  Timberline is higher up and is usually first to open and they run through the summer.  I have had some good times up there in July.  You can also hit Mt Bachelor in bend, and there is Mt Ashalnd down south and Anthony lakes waaaay the F out east.  You are not far from Crystal, Baker, Snoqualmie, and Steven's pass.  And it's only 8hrs to whistler.

Excellent reply, thank you for the information!

The idea would be to work in North Plains and live somewhere west of there. I am finding how insane the housing market is over there, wow.

When we left Dallas, I vowed to not live or work in a metro area again. Hopefully we can stay  on the out skirts as much as possible. I'm not sure how much Portland hipster I could stomach.

Imagine this, only with today's proliferation of the gay logger aesthetic added in.  

About as I expected.

Where would you work in North Plains?  Not exactly a sprawling hub of economic opportunity there.  But if your job is in NP and you want to live west of there, the commute wouldn't be terrible at all.  Very little traffic, unless there is a major accident.  You could get a place in or around Vernonia.  It tends to be a bit cheaper to live there.  Only issue is that hwy 47 floods right where it meets up with hwy 26 sometimes and thus you'd not be able to get to work.  You could look around banks/manning, but housing there is in somewhat high demand as many people like yourself want it so they can still commute, but live in the hills.  Many of the peoples are intel employees and such.  But with intel laying off a ton of people, I think the housing market my cool off a bit out here.  Also, I think our real estate bubble will probably be busting here with in the next year or 2.  Right now it is at another peak, just like 2007/2008.  Great time to sell and move out of the area.  Bad time to buy IMO, unless money is no object.  But the further away from portland you are, the less effected the pricing seems to be.  Now if we could get all the douchy faux-logger hipsters to leave and go to Pittsburg PA or something, this place would get a lot better.

If you can afford to live in the 97229 area housing and schools are very good. Housing is expensive, but they climb in value. Be prepared for bidding wars, it's very common. Scappoose, st helens they will not climb at the same rate, and the roads to climb over the hill to get to west side can suck. Also look at Banks, OR, it's next to North plains just a bit further west.

Thanks for the input guys, but the deal fell though.

Was looking forward to it too.

I appreciate everyone's input and help.

Bummer. Good luck in Idaho. Let us know if you come this way to shoot.

Will do. After all the research, the wife wants to make a trip anyways.