Our 12-year-old grandson Isaac joined us for this part of our journey. It was great to have him with us for about 10 days. West coast RV parks have tended to not have pools, but Isaac was lucky and we had a pool at both campgrounds for his visit and we didn’t miss many days in the pool!
The Columbia River Gorge is a canyon of the Columbia River, created over the last 17 million years as the river has cut through the Cascade Range. Up to 4,000 feet deep, the gorge stretches for over 80 miles. Along the way numerous waterfalls have been created. The climate transitions from 10 inches of rainfall each year in the east to 100 inches in the west near Portland.
After a few days in the gorge we moved closer to Mt Hood, an 11,249-ft stratovolcano that is considered to be active. The last minor eruption occurred in 1907. There are lots of outdoor activities available in the area. We rode the ski lift up to an elevation of about 7000 ft and did a little exploring. We found pumice, volcanic boulders, and and high-altitude plants. We also went kayaking in a local lake and hiking to see a few waterfalls. We were at Mt Hood in late July and several slopes were still open for skiing and snowboarding.
While near Portland we were lucky enough to have dinner with our friends from Neenah, WI — Greg and Marcia Macdonald, Em, and Courtney (who took the photo). We enjoyed some super Oregon beer, good food, and great company alongside the Columbia River.
Marcia told us about the world’s largest bookstore which is located in Portland, Powell’s City of Books. We went to Powell’s with Isaac and another friend from our days in Neenah, Rob Reinders, who was in Portland for a few days. The book store is massive and has a huge variety of new and used books, including a large rare books section. We hadn’t seen Rob for several years and enjoyed our evening with him. Oh yeah, and Joe parallel parked our dually in downtown Portland and managed to get close enough to the curb that the light rail didn’t hit the truck or need to slow down to avoid it!
The Columbia River Gorge, Mt Hood and Portland were fun. We had been in the woods for about two weeks and a little civilization was good for us. There is much more to do than we had time for, but that often happens to us. The area is a nice combination of outdoor activities and large city.