Twin Falls to Portland Oregon

We woke up early because we had a 500 Mile drive between Twin Falls and Cascade Locks Oregon. The scenery was absolutely gorgeous and the Elkhorn mountains near the Oregon/Idaho border had a substantial amount of snow on them. 

                              Starting to get excited as we see the Columbia River come into view. 

Playing Peek A boo with a Semi on the road. Scenery is very arid still.

We pulled into the campground at about 6:30 at night, tired from a long day of driving and ready to eat.

The Next day, we decided we wanted to see the most famous waterfall of the Columbia River Gorge area, and we reckoned that we brought our bikes, so we may as well use the local bike trail to go see them instead of driving in the truck. We ended up being totally wrecked at the end of the day, the bike ride was a total of 31 miles, up and down hills. The bike trail, and scenery were absolutely beautiful. The river gorge is very narrow, so sometimes the bike trail was above the interstate, sometimes below it, sometimes beside it.

Had to push the bikes up a staircase on the bike trail. A tire groove was helpfully cut out on the side of the staircase to make it easy to push the bikes.

View from the staircase of the Eastbound I-84 coming out of a tunnel.

View of the west bound I-84 from the bike trail high above 

Salmon Hatchery right off the bike trail that let you walk around on your own. These are baby CoHo salmon according to the sign.

Finally made it to the crown jewel waterfall of the Columbia River Gorge: Multnomah Falls. It was spectacular.

More random waterfalls off the bike trail. There were lots of these, but they all looked small after Multnomah Falls.

Another view on the way back high above the East and Westbound I-84, plus the very active train track below.

Made it back to town/ Cascade Locks. We had planned to make dinner, but at this point we could barely walk, and so this little hamburger stand on the corner with no name was our dinner. The food was excellent and the ice cream was top notch. We came back again for ice cream the next day.

The next morning, we could barely walk, so we wanted an easy day. The dogs also needed some physical activity after staying in the motorhome all day, so we decided to take them to Thunder Island, a park on an island right in Cascade Locks to play ball with the dogs, then read books for a few hours.

Playing with the Dogs on Thunder Island in the middle of the Columbia River. Beautiful Setting.

Our Book Reading place on Thunder Island, watching boats go by. 

After reading for a few hours, we decided we needed more ice cream from the hamburger stand with no name. The dogs were with us, so of course they got a cone to share.

We also walked down main street a bit to look at the Bridge of the Gods, which goes across the river from Oregon to Washington. It costs $3.00 to cross each way. We were amazed at the grating, and that you could see the cars from underneath. 

The next day, we decided to drive into Portland to attend a farmers market, as well as get some errands done. Portland is full of ........... very very interesting people, but the most interesting one by far was the man who had a huge full size cat that stayed on his hat and shoulders as he walked around the city. No pictures, we did not think about it. Heather was amazed at the local Target that had a basket escalator, because it was two stories.

After getting our errands done, we decided to come back out to the Gorge for more sightseeing. First we stopped at the Columbia River Vista House to take in the view.

Then we decided to take a hike to Wahkeena and Fairy falls. This hike was 1,000 ft straight up over a few miles, but had beautiful views of the falls and the Columbia Gorge below.

Our last and final day at Cascade Locks, we decided to go see Mt. St Helens, as Heather has always wanted to see it. We were shocked at how much snow the mountain still has on it, and wonder if all that snow will actually melt this summer. 

We drove down on some Forest Roads to try and get closer to the mountain and do some hikes through the lava, but the US forest service is really fond of installing gates across roads and trails and prohibiting people from really doing much of anything down there. The forest service must have millions spent on gates and fences, and we saw a contractor putting more up.  Then they get mad when people make their own trails. We were able to find a small hike that was open, which featured a crawl through a lava tube!

It was small and dark in there! Sean is way too Claustrophobic, and Heather started to feel it as well when she got down there, so backed out of it. We did see some kids with headlamps successfully complete the crawl.

After trying to see some more trails and viewpoints, and the Forest Service having nearly all of them closed, we came back towards Stevenson, Washington for a waterfall hike that Sean had seen on the map. Sean knew nothing about the hike, just it was a hike to a waterfall. We did not have much hope for it, but wanted to get the dogs out walking after everything being closed.

The trail, and the waterfall were absolutely amazing! This waterfall was one of Seans favorites he has ever seen! Watch the video to get a reference to how big it was!

After hiking back out of the trail, we learned that the waterfall is called the "Falls Creek Waterfall". It was late and we were ready to eat, so we headed towards home stopping at the local grocery store in Stevenson, Washington, before heading over the toll bridge back to Cascade Locks, Oregon and home.