Where are the hippie towns? (Seattle, Bellingham: transplants, houses, college)

[beautifulseattlehomes]

Vashon Island and South Whidbey Island for sure...but I agree with some of the posts here. In general the Washington vibe is different and it doesn't tend to be the crunchy easy going hippie vibe you will find in places in Oregon and N. Cal. I guess I would look at Bellingham and Olympia too.

I think a lot of the lack of this easy going hippie vibe has to do with the transformation of Seattle and its environs from a sleepy little place in the PNW to a worldwide tech powerhouse that is quite frankly, expensive to live in and pretty serious about its work culture!

[ctr88]

I agree too, Seattle and WA State have less of the hippie vibe I thought it would have.

On a different note, a lot of the small town and small mountain towns in WA State are economically depressed scruffy not very attractive blue collar towns. I was kind of disappointed in driving around WA State that there are really few cool quaint small towns like say Vermont has.

Parts of Vermont have a hippie vibe (Burlington, Montpelier, Brattleboro). Brattleboro VT is a extremely artsy, organic hippie small town. San Francisco has a lot less of a hippie vibe as it once did, it's now more filled with very high income techie hipsters.

Some places in the U.S. that still have a little bit of a hippie vibe - but none as much as they used to:
-Burlington, Montpelier, Brattleboro VT
-Boulder CO (although it's become very yuppie)
-Portland and Eugene OR
-Humbolt County CA (although more marijuana white rastafarian types)
-SF, Berkeley and parts of Marin Co (although less so)
-Asheville NC
-Missoula MT
-Madison WI
-Austin TX (now more hispster though)
-Woodstock NY (still has a little bit of that hippie vibe)
-Santa Cruz CA
-Greenwich Village NYC used to have it - not sure if any remnants left - maybe Williamsburg Brooklyn?
-Capitol Hill and Fremont area of Seattle (like people said not much any more though)
-Ocean Beach and North Park San Diego
-Santa Monica CA (used to have it, not much any more...maybe more Silver Lake LA area now)
-Key West FL

I too like living in areas with that old hippie vibe. They tend to be walkable, have co-ops, less car culture, mom & pop establishments, good farmers markets, etc... More of a community feel. A lot of the areas with the hippie vibe have become extremely expensive, some of the highest cost of housing in the U.S. One reason for that is the artist/hippie vibe creates a place with a high quality of life. Look at all the cities above, they are some of the highest priced real estate areas in the U.S....SF, Capitol Hill, Boulder CO, Marin. Even places like Santa Fe and Madison are the most expensive areas in their respective states. Walkable cool cities attract high income hipsters. Places like Dallas, Orlando, Salt Lake, Tampa, St. Louis, Charlotte, Phoenix which are all very NON hippie....all have cheap house prices because they don't have the cool walkable communities that high income people want to live in.

[Seacove]

People listing towns in Vermont and NC as the "real" hippie alternatives should remember that, like WA, they are exceptions. Vermont, while quite liberal, has some very depressed areas. It's pretty but a lot of those towns are quite poor, just like parts of Washington. And NC may have a very small selection of hippie(ish) towns, but NC is generally quite conservative and their elections are reflecting an ever-growing right wing direction that might ultimately hurt the Triangle's attempts to grow their tech culture. Listing these NC towns as alternatives to Seattle is wishfully ignoring what's been happening. A lot of coastal Oregon and California sure and yes, Seattle does have a slightly uptight, PC tone to its liberalness (Seattleites don't like confrontations).

[CarawayDJ]

Originally Posted by beautifulseattlehomes

Vashon Island and South Whidbey Island for sure...but I agree with some of the posts here. In general the Washington vibe is different and it doesn't tend to be the crunchy easy going hippie vibe you will find in places in Oregon and N. Cal. I guess I would look at Bellingham and Olympia too.

I think a lot of the lack of this easy going hippie vibe has to do with the transformation of Seattle and its environs from a sleepy little place in the PNW to a worldwide tech powerhouse that is quite frankly, expensive to live in and pretty serious about its work culture!

My definition of a hippie must be outdated. I just moved to South Whidbey. I wouldn't live anywhere close to hippies as I define them.

[lucy1965]

Originally Posted by ctr88

Places like Dallas, Orlando, Salt Lake, Tampa, St. Louis, Charlotte, Phoenix which are all very NON hippie....all have cheap house prices because they don't have the cool walkable communities that high income people want to live in.

. . . and as ever, there are exceptions within the cities. I live in Salt Lake -- the 9th and 9th District, specifically -- and housing prices here are generally $50,000 higher than the average for the county because it's one of the best walkable communities in the state. Our housing stock tends to sell in two weeks, too.

That said, if the husband gets an offer we'll be heading to Seattle: I can't handle the temperature extremes and we've both got friends in the city; we've never really clicked here.

[lucy1965]

Originally Posted by Seacove

People listing towns in Vermont and NC as the "real" hippie alternatives should remember that, like WA, they are exceptions. [...] And NC may have a very small selection of hippie(ish) towns, but NC is generally quite conservative and their elections are reflecting an ever-growing right wing direction that might ultimately hurt the Triangle's attempts to grow their tech culture. Listing these NC towns as alternatives to Seattle is wishfully ignoring what's been happening.

Plural of "anecdote" still isn't "data", but I have friends who left Asheville for Bellingham two years ago because they couldn't deal with the state politics any more, and decided that the last vote they had that mattered was voting with their feet and taking their tax revenue elsewhere.

[orzo]

Port Townsend fits the bill! Although, it is just a little more upscale than most hippie towns.

Bellingham is a great hippie town as well, even though it is about an hour and a half from Seattle.

[RunTheDistance476]

Originally Posted by RotseCherut

Olympia is about the only real hippy town I can find in Washington.. More of the "real" hippy towns are in Oregon, where I grew up, along with Northern California. Washington is a much more reserved state and tends to be a bit more hipstery/grungy/blue-collar/redneck or just plain Scandanavian Liberalish. It doesn't have that free-spirited, open-minded, cross-cultural, free-your-soul, let your hair/dreadlocks down type of vibe that you would see in many Oregon towns.

I lived in a town called Eugene, Oregon that is probably, along with Eureka, California, the hippy capitol of the USA. It was one of the most common places for the Grateful Dead to do their tours and many Deadheads settled in that town. Sadly, I believe Oregon is changing a bit due to the influx of people from the East Coast and around the country who are trying to transform Portland and other Oregon towns into places like where they came from.

I was just in Portland last week and was amazed though at how much more laid-back and hippyish the vibe is compared to Seattle, which is more mainstream and much more formal and less funky (if we can use that term). Even being away from Oregon for 2 years, has made me forget the differences from where I am now. Actually, Seattle is one of the least hip and least culturally diverse/enlightened/funky places I have been. People seem very serious, professional and mainstream and tend to fear or, at least, lack understanding of people who are a bit exotic and outside the cultural norms of the city and behavior of people in the state of Washington.

So much negativity in this post.............................................. .....................................

[RotseCherut]

Originally Posted by wlw2009

So much negativity in this post.............................................. .....................................

Sometimes honesty is negative.. How long have you lived in the Pacific Northwest? I doubt as long as myself. I actually grew up in some hippy towns , unlike you, probably.

Originally Posted by orzo

Port Townsend fits the bill! Although, it is just a little more upscale than most hippie towns.

Bellingham is a great hippie town as well, even though it is about an hour and a half from Seattle.

I lived in Bellingham over last summer and it is in no way a hippy town by any means. There are some hippies in the town, but overall, it is like a mini-Seattle and caters more to the grungy, new-age and hipster types. I also found the mentality of people in the town a bit cold, distant and hostile. It doesn't have the friendly, open-minded hippy vibe you would see in a place like Eugene, Ashland or even in Corvallis, OR. Bellingham also lacked the funkiness, spirituality and counter-culture that you would experience from "real" hippies in Oregon towns. Actually, everyone in Bellingham seem to try to fit in with the crowd, rather than be unique or different. The town also had a very anti-religious, anti-spiritual and atheistic vibe to it. Whereas in Ashland or Eugene you would meet Wiccans, people who worship fairies, pagan gods an goddesses, in Bellingham you would be looked down on. The average Bellinghamster I talk to would claim spirituality is bad and that all religion and spiritually is man-made. It appeared that Bellingham people enjoyed loud music, being heavily intoxicated and stoned and not engaging in any type of cultural activities revolving around the spiritual realm. Hippy culture embraces spirituality, which is the anti-thesis of a Bellingham person.

IF you go hear some of the local live bands play, their themes are all about having dirty sex with women, getting high and making fun of Jesus. That seems to be the new cool thing for people to do.

Don't get "liberal, progressive" mixed up with hippies. Actually, some hippies I knew back in Oregon were anything but liberal and progressive, despite the tied-dyed shirts and long hair. At least with Oregon hippies, there were a fair share of them who were gun-toting, racist redneckish with tied-dyed shirts and hemp necklaces. They were country people who grew up in a sub-culture, but still among the culture of the people where they lived. Of course, there was many of the flower children, rainbow children and other peace/loving types thrown into the mix.

[west seattle gal]

Originally Posted by Seacove

People listing towns in Vermont and NC as the "real" hippie alternatives should remember that, like WA, they are exceptions. Vermont, while quite liberal, has some very depressed areas. It's pretty but a lot of those towns are quite poor, just like parts of Washington. And NC may have a very small selection of hippie(ish) towns, but NC is generally quite conservative and their elections are reflecting an ever-growing right wing direction that might ultimately hurt the Triangle's attempts to grow their tech culture. Listing these NC towns as alternatives to Seattle is wishfully ignoring what's been happening. A lot of coastal Oregon and California sure and yes, Seattle does have a slightly uptight, PC tone to its liberalness (Seattleites don't like confrontations).

Yeah, the politics in NC are definitely scary. But I think that is why the OP is looking for the same hippy vibe (found only in NC pockets) in a more liberal state.