RETIREMENT TRIP #7

Hood River Valley Exploration

                                                                           On the road by 8 a.m., we passed the wind farm again.  The windmills were all gracefully spinning in the early morning breeze.

“Maybe we could put one in our yard,” I mused out loud.  “They are so pretty to look at and we could even generate electricity and save money.”

Andy scowled.  “They kill lots of birds,” he countered.  “I guess birds try to land on them—big birds—birds of prey like hawks and eagles and falcons.  They must misjudge the power of the blades.”

“Woodpeckers!” I exclaimed.  “We could put up a windmill and get the woodpeckers!”  All summer we had battled woodpeckers on the hummingbird feeders.  “Could you call that killing two birds with one windmill?”

He didn’t think I was funny.

Wide and beautiful, the Columbia from Rowena Crest,
looks more like a huge lake.

In The Dalles, Andy put me in charge of finding the Rowena Loops, a narrow winding road along the Columbia.  “Me” in charge is never a good thing when it comes to navigation, because Andy rarely tells me precisely where we are in the first place, but this time success was mine.

A couple turns and we were following the mighty Columbia along a narrow road through the country at the base of the Gorge to the Rowena Crest Viewpoint. 

Spectacular, rugged country
spreads in every direction
from Rowena Crest.

Wind whipped across the plateau at Rowena Loops. We walked around the circle for views of the river far below and the famous Rowena Loops Road that circled the canyon wall to the top of the plateau.  A cold wind made it hard to steady the camera, but the scenes were magnificent.

The graceful S-curve of Rowena Loops almost doubles
back on itself.

From the viewpoint we could see Mount Adams in the distance.  “Mount Adams is a thousand feet higher than Mount Hood,” said Andy.  “This is our third visit here.  We came in 1978 with the kids.  Tara was just a baby.  And we came once when we flew to Portland, but I don’t think we ever drove this stretch.”

Cataclysmic floods during the twilight of the Ice Age affected the landscape, creating scablands called the Rowena Plateau.  The massive ice sheet that covered Canada dammed rivers up to 2,000 feet thick with glacial ice.  The largest of these held more than 500 cubic miles of water.  Rising waters undermined the ice dams, causing huge floods to sweep down the Columbia, scouring the land as many as 100 times and creating the formations of today.

Away from the ridge,
the country side offers peace.

The graceful, winding historic Columbia River Highway was one of the first modern thoroughfares in the Pacific Northwest.  Engineer John A. Elliott determined that the eastern section should be built in concert with the gentle turns of the western end.  So he echoed the loops with sweeping S-turns here along the cliff face.  Hence, the Rowena Loops.

At Memaloose Overlook we read about the ancient Indian practice of leaving their dead in a canoe on an island in the middle of the Columbia River.  The bodies were wrapped in robes or tule mats.  Memaloose is derived from the Chinook word “memalust,” which means “to die.”  Lewis and Clark named the island Sepulcher Island and visited it in 1806.

Far below and to the right is all that
remains of Memaloose Island.

The singular monument marks
the grave of pioneer Victor Trevitt.

The lone monument visible today marks the grave of Victor Trevitt, a pioneer, printer, businessman, state legislator and friend to the Indians.  He requested burial here among the people he loved.  The building of Bonneville Dam prompted relocation of the Indian graves in the 1930’s, and ironically only Trevitt’s grave remains. 

From the top of the Memaloose Viewpoint, we see Mount
Hood.  Mount Adams was also visible.

What a spectacular view we had of the only remaining island since the dam was constructed.  And all but about a third of Memaloose Island was under water now. 

In the other direction we could see wind surfers sweeping back and forth across the Columbia, their fluorescent green sails twisting and turning in the wind.  The gusts must have been 50 m.p.h., since I couldn’t hold the camera steady.  “Down there, they’re lovin’ it!” said Andy.  White caps dotted the whole river from shore to shore.

With careful map reading we found Panorama Point in the Panorama Point County Park.  The guidebook said this stop offered “the best views of the Hood River Valley, stretching from Mount Hood to the Columbia River Gorge.”  The view features more than 15,000 acres of orchards and vineyards.  A tower at the viewpoint actually decorates one of the stations of the power lines that stretch from a dam on the Columbia.  It was a clever way to lend beauty to something detracting and ugly on the landscape.

Bradford Island Visitor Center at Bonneville Dam was a couple miles in from the main road and a security check of the car by an armed guard.

We watched the salmon and sturgeon navigate the fish ladders from outside above the water and inside beneath the water.  What a fascinating display of power and determination!

Visible under the water,
salmon climb the fish ladders.

At Bonneville the fish ladders were built when the dam was constructed in the 1930’s.  Slots at the face of the dam guide fish to the four fish ladders that lead to a fish collection channel so they can continue to swim upstream.

“Lots of injured ones come through,” said one guide, “because of all the sea lions below the dam.”

We didn’t see any sea lions.

Salmon and sturgeon climb the fish ladders in
full view of the public at Bonneville Dam.

It takes an average salmon 36-38 hours to go through all the steps in the ladder.  “The steps are about a foot each,” said the guide, “and there are spots to rest for the fish.  But they have to go up a total of 60 feet.  Some can make it in as little as two hours; others can take as long as 48 hours.”  The whole process was fascinating.

Inside the Visitor Center I read all kinds of interesting facts about the dam.  Studies have shown that fish now swim past the dam just as successfully as they swim through comparable undammed rivers.

The dam has a spillway, like all dams, for when flow is excessive.  With the spillway open wide, the water flow is 12,000,000 gallons per second.

Construction of Bonneville by the Army Corps of Engineers began in 1933, and the lock and dam was dedicated by President Franklin D. Roosevelt on September 28, 1937.  Then the total construction cost was $88.4 million. 

Bonneville Lock and Dam is named for Army Captain Benjamin Bonneville, an early day visionary who led an exploration to the Oregon Country and charted extensive sections of what became the Oregon Trail.



Bonneville, the first of four dams on the Columbia,
generates power for thousands.

Lake Bonneville, the 48-mile long reservoir impounded by the dam, is the first in a series of navigable lakes which are part of the Columbia-Snake Inland Waterway, a water highway running 465 miles from the Pacific Ocean to Lewiston, Idaho.


Sometimes in the spring when water is high and winds are blowing, the Northwest United States runs almost entirely on renewable power.  No wonder our rates out East are so high!

Hydroelectric dams provide the nation’s largest source of renewable energy perpetually fueled by nature.  The four dams on the Columbia—Bonneville, The Dalles, John Day, McNary—produce as much energy as 20 coal-fired power plants but without the pollution or greenhouse gases.



Wahclella Falls tumbles in
majesty over the cliff face
even in the dry season.

The next stop was the Locks.  We read that the newest lock took 38 million gallons to fill—enough water to take a bath every hour for 110 years.  All boats can use the lock system, and the new one can hold a tug and five barges at once.  Mostly wheat, gasoline, fertilizer and lumber products travel through the locks on a regular basis.

At Horsetail Falls we trade picture-
taking with another couple.

Our next stop was the Columbia River Gorge.  The trail to Wahclella Falls was a two-mile, semi-loop up some steep terrain.  Lots and lots of people climbed the narrow, rocky path to view the first falls down a step flat rock face and the second falls, a series of three separate drops over the cliff head into a narrow ravine.  Moss coated the tree trunks and dripped from the branches.

Horsetail Falls was a crazy house of people.

“I just can’t believe how much water is coming down in the driest time of year,” said Andy.  We hopped out for pictures, but Andy never was one for staying where people congregated.
Temperatures cooled off after 3:30 p.m. as we neared Wahkeena.  Wahkeena Falls was only a quarter-mile in uphill to the bridge.  The path was steep but paved with asphalt.  It would have been a refreshing place to stop and sit, if it weren’t for the spray and all the people.

Crossing the small bridge
below Wahkeena Falls,
we are doused with spray.

My immediate concern was about protecting the camera.  Lush vegetation lined both sides of the trail.  “It’s a Pacific Maritime climate,” said Andy, “dry in the summer and rainy all winter.  The growth is temperate rainforest.  It doesn’t get super cold for long stretches.  I read,” he continued, “that every mile you travel inland from Portland, the land gets drier and the amount of rain goes down.”

A bright yellow lichen
paints the wall next to
Latourell Falls.

Latourell Falls dropped in a single stream from the top of the cliff.  Bright yellow lichens painted the adjoining cliff face.  We probably walked a mile before deciding the actual trail wasn’t a loop and we’d have to retrace our steps to the car.  Later in the parking lot a gentleman told us the trail actually did loop back in a 2.8-mile circle.  It was already 4:30 p.m. when we got back to the car.  “We’ll have time to come back tomorrow if we get up early,” said Andy.  But he wasn’t done for today yet.

The view from Larch Mountain summit spans the world!
But temperatures plummet by late afternoon.

Andy had one final plan for September 11th—the 14-mile drive up Larch Mountain.  The road wound crazily through thick woods and past sections that had been clear-cut logged in and away from the road.  The sun hardly penetrated the stately pines, so only occasionally was the cutting noticeable. 
We parked at the summit lot and hiked the .3-mile Sherrard’s Point Trail up about 50 stairs to the peak.   What a view!  Mount Jefferson, 62 miles away, stood out clearly in the distance; the other peaks were hidden in clouds.  Mount Rainier, 97 miles, was barely visible; the top of Mount Hood, 22 miles, peaked through now and then, and Mount Adams, 46 miles, was encircled in clouds.  We visited with a local couple who were entertaining friends from Virginia.  By the time we started down, the temperatures had dropped into the low 50’s or maybe even high 40’s.  It was cold at 4,056 feet, and it was time to go home!