Mt. Hood and other Sights

Our plan on Monday was to take a drive to see Mt. Hood. We opted instead to take a day of rest: stay at the campground, take it easy, and take a break from driving. We transferred our Monday plans to Tuesday. It's a good thing we did. The weather Monday was rainy and overcast, and there wouldn't have been any good views of Mt. Hood. Tuesday's weather was sunny and beautiful.

We left from the campground in Portland and drove east to the Mt. Hood National Forest, wherein lies Mt. Hood. Along the way, we drove through a few towns with interesting names. First we drove through Boring, Oregon, with a big sign saying "Welcome to Boring." Then we drove through Zigzag - we went straight through; we did not zigzag. And then we drove through the flowery town of Rhododendron.

As we drove through Mt. Hood National Forest, we first drove along a road that runs east-west on the south side of Mt. Hood, and then we headed north. We were able to see some nice views of the gigantic mountain at various spots along the way. The volcanic mountains of the northwest are amazing, massive mountains, very impressive. 

Mt. Hood

As we were driving around the mountain, there were many fruit stands along the way, as this area is prodigiously bountiful in produce. In fact, there are so many fruit stands that they call the drive the "Fruit Loop". We stopped at a couple of stands and purchased some cherries, apples, and hazelnuts.

Draper Girls Fruit Stand

Pearl's Place Fruit Stand

After leaving the "Fruit Loop", we continued driving east to the town of The Dalles. I didn't accidentally capitalize the word The. The word The is actually part of the town name - The Dalles. The Dalles is located along the Columbia River and in addition to more nice scenery along the river, the town is also known for its dam - The Dalles Dam. We stopped near the dam to take a few pictures. Notice the fish ladder along one side of the dam, which is provided for the fish, especially salmon, to be able to swim upstream. 

The Dalles Dam

Fish Ladder

The roads that we traveled today were part of the Oregon Trail.

After leaving The Dalles, we began traveling back west along the Columbia River Gorge, continuing to have interesting scenery along the way.

We stopped at the Columbia River Discovery Center. Inside the Discovery Center, we stopped at the desk to inquire about a few other sights we were interested in around this area. One of them, a museum, was across the river on the Washington (state) side. When we inquired about that particular museum, the lady behind the desk told us in a very serious tone that "That's in Washington". It was a tone that practically forbade us from going there. 

We walked around the Discovery Center and browsed some very interesting exhibits.

Columbia Gorge Discovery Center

In the main hallway of the Discovery Center, the first thing that catches your eye is what looks like a spill on the floor, like someone spilled some water. It is actually a display showing the Columbia River.

After leaving the Discovery Center, we traveled along the Columbia River Historic Highway to a bridge called the bridge of the gods, for some reason. This took us into Washington and the "forbidden" museum. The Columbia River Museum is situated along, what else?, the Columbia River, and we enjoyed some fantastic scenes of the Columbia River Gorge along the way.

The most interesting part of the Columbia River Museum was that it contained the world's largest collection of rosaries, really, they're in the Guinness Book of Records, we were told. There were over 4000 rosaries, and a really nice altar scene.

Columbia River Museum

More nice scenery on the way back to Oregon

We left the Columbia River Museum and traveled back to the Oregon side. This gorge of the Columbia River contains some really high, steep mountains and as a result also contains a number of waterfalls. The famous Multnomah Falls is in this area, but we did not hike the 2 to 3 hour trail to view it. Instead we took the easy way out, and hiked the 1 mile (more or less) to see the Bridal Veil Falls, which we were told were just as beautiful as Multnomah.

The path to the Falls

More of the path

Bridal Veil Falls

Wonder why they call it Bridal Veil. Hmm.

The last stop of the day was at the Vista at Crown Point. We drove up a steep and windy road to a vista that gave us a fantastic view of the valley below.

After leaving Crown Point, we returned to our campground in Portland.