From Hood River, we returned to Cascade Falls to bike the Historic Columbia River Highway and visit the Bonneville Dam Visitor Center. We then continued farther downstream, back through the last lock at Bonneville, through the navigable waters of the Willamette River and back to Portland for the night.
The Bonneville Dam Visitor Center unfortunately was even more unfriendly to bicycles and pedestrians than Ice Harbor was: the Army Corps of Engineers wouldn’t allow us in unless we could produce a motor vehicle. But we had an excellent bike ride along the old highway and saw many waterfalls that day and the next: Ruckel Creek, Wahclella, Multnomah, Dutchman, Ecola, Fairy and Wakheena. And we hiked to 2,500′ Devil’s rest for sweeping views up and down the river. We also got a close-up view to the sternwheeler Queen of the West, tied alongside as we went through the Bonneville Lock.
Here’s our log from Hood River to Portland. You also can display these on the map view.
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05/08/12: Flume
Broughton Lumber Company flume just east of Drano Lake. Between 1922 and 1986 the flume carried logs from a sawmill to a finishing plant nine miles away.
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05/08/12: Queen of the West
The sternwheeler we saw earlier in Richland, Queen of the West, moored at Stevenson. We didn’t know it, but we’d be getting a lot closer view of that boat tomorrow.
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05/08/12: Entering Port of Cascade Marina
We’re back at Cascade Locks to bike along the Historic Columbia River Highway State Trail to the Bonneville Dam. The marina entrance is narrow, with opposing wind and currents. And once past the narrow entrance, you have to make an immediate right turn onto the transient dock. That’s when you find out if the docks have space or if you have to back out.
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05/08/12: Tight squeeze
We had a bit of a tight squeeze getting in this time–sailboats were docked on both sides of the fairway. It made getting through the entry look easy.
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05/08/12: On the trail
The Historic Columbia River Highway was built as a scenic route in the 1920s, but quickly fell into disuse when vehicle traffic increased and was closed when I-84 opened. Starting in the 1980s, large portions have been restored for car traffic. The section we’re on, from Cascade Locks to Moffett Creek, is open to cyclists and pedestrians only. The trail is wonderful, and its nice not to worry about vehicle traffic.
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05/08/12: Sheridan State Park
Interpretive signs are all along the trail, detailing the highway’s history.
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05/08/12: Eagle Creek Hatchery
A major hatchery is at Eagle Creek. When we were there, the tanks held 4.5 million Chinook smolt.
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05/08/12: Stairs
Just beyond the hatchery, an old flight of stairs was the only real obstacle on the path. Our bikes are light, so carrying them up wasn’t difficult.
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05/08/12: Lookout
Enjoying the view from one of the old highway lookouts. The old road really was beautifully done.
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05/08/12: New lock
The new navigation lock that we passed through earlier on the trip and will pass through tomorrow.
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05/08/12: Crossing Tanner Creek
After the falls, we crossed Tanner Creek on the old highway and continued to the end of the trail, not much father along at Moffett Creek.
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05/09/12: Backing out
We slid out backwards between the two sailboats, and then around the corner and out the entrance. The aft helm is handy for maneuvers like this.
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05/09/12: This will be fun
Olaf J also was wanting to lock through and radioed Queen of the West to discuss the possibility. They agreed and suggested this to the lockmaster, who replied “I look forward to it. This will be fun.” That’s another difference between this and the Ballard locks in Seattle: here the boats tend to discuss shared locking options and then radio the lockmaster for approval. In the Ballard locks, the boats don’t communicate like that and the lockmaster just directs everything.
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05/09/12: Coming alongside
Not as tight as this morning’s marina exit, but not a lot of extra space either.
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05/09/12: Olaf J
The captain stopped the Olaf J just outside the locks to let the Queen of the West pass.
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05/09/12: Trail to the top
Then we saw a sign indiciting the top of the falls was about a mile’s walk. We had to do that. This is the view looking back to Dirona from partway up.
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05/09/12: Top of the falls
We’re really up there–542′. At the top right is the viewing area and the bridge across the front of the falls.
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05/09/12: View from the top
Looking across the Columbia from the viewpoint. Dirona is visible at the mid-left of the picture.
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05/09/12: Second Bridge
Beyond the viewpoint spur, the trail continued farther along Multnomah creek and crossed on a stone-fronted culvert.
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05/09/12: Dutchman Falls
The sun-dappled woods were wondefully serene, and the trail was easy to follow. So we continued along the creek and soon came to another set of falls.
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05/09/12: Trail to Devil’s Rest
1.6 miles to Devil’s Rest. We’d already hiked way farther than we’d expected to when we left Dirona. But we’d come this far, so might as well get that view.
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05/09/12: Looking north
That white speck way in the distance close to shore is Dirona. . We were now at 2,500 feet and had sweeping views up and down the river. (For a more interesting visualization of the hike, select terrain view under street map at the top right of the large map).
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05/09/12: Beacon Rockstrong>
800′ Beacon Rock seemed so big when we’d climbed on our way upriver, but looked pretty puny in comparison.
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05/09/12: Fairy Falls
From the Devil’s Rest trail, we returned down along Wahkeena Trail towards Wahkeena Falls. Along the way are the 20-foot Fairy Falls.
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05/10/12: St. Johns Bridge
Looking back on the St. Johns suspension bridge, the first of fourteen bridges that span the Willamette at Portland.
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05/10/12: Portland Shipyard
Ship in drydock at the Portland Shipyard on Swan Island. Several large ships were at the yard, including the USS Paul F. Foster to the right of the cranes.
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05/10/12: Fremont Bridge
Passing under I-405. The Fremont Bridge is the second longest tied arch bridge in the world.
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05/10/12: Downtown Portland
Portland is a city not know for its sunny days. We’ve been very lucky with the weather.
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05/10/12: Elk Rock Island
Approaching Elk Rock Island. The Willamette River was tranquil and cozy feeling compared to the larger Columbia and Snake rivers. We quite enjoyed our cruise there.
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05/10/12: Stephen Cridland
Our friend Stephen Cridlan, who did the photography for our Circumnavigator shoot, saw us on the way upriver while he was out fishing and flagged us down when we returned. He’d called us on the cell phone after we passed before and recommended some stops, including the Cedar Island anchorage.
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05/10/12: Tom McCall Public Dock
Moored for the night at the public docks off downtown Portland. We collected a lot of wood in a short time.
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05/10/12: Steel Bridge
Crossing over the top level of the Steel Bridge we’d passed under earlier. The Burnside Bascule Bridge is in the distance.
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05/10/12: Bridgeport Pub
We did a mini-pub crawl, stopping off first at Henry’s Tavern to sample from their selection of over 100 beers on tap. We finished the evening farther north with an excellent meal and pints at the Bridgeport Pub.
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