COLUMBIA RIVER AND SAN JUAN BOATING ADVENTURES

The Columbia River shoulders its way through narrow gorges in places and spreads out like the photo to be wide and remote. The photo was taken between the Snake River entrance to the Columbia and The Dalles, where the familiar Columbia Gorge begins. Here, though, the few inhabitants along the river are engaged in grape-growing and ranching.

Historically, down river a short way the river plunged over Celilo Falls, a mainstay site for Indian fishermen. The locals accepted an offer to purchase the Falls by the government, and a dam eventually was built there to smooth the way for upriver transportation by barge or boats. Although it appears that, for once, the government did reimburse the Indians fairly, the tribes still mourn the decision, as the Falls were an important part of everyone's lives and traditions.

Downriver a bit more is a mecca for wind surfers because of the usual strong winds that are formed by the gorge. The area becomes a colorful panorama of bright sails skipping across the ruffled waters.

Back in Bellingham, my area, summers are hot, almost too hot at more than 80 degrees and generally dry for most summer months. Our refuges from heat become the San Juan Islands or Lake Whatcom, about 15 miles long at the very edge of the city, or other smaller lakes. Bellingham Bay blossoms with the sails of larger boats, sometimes host to major sailing races. I have enjoyed both boating on the Columbia, 200 miles distant, or locally in the San Juans and Bellingham Bay at my doorstep, especially the research for my book, Columbia River (Caxton Press, 2013) on the historical and present happenings along this 1200+ mile river. My own family has had a small cabin in the San Juans for decades, so I already had enjoyed many experiences and conversations with fellow islanders to contribute to the San Juans: Into the 21st Century, and to share them with you.

While doing a magazine article about a major race beginning in Bellingham some years ago, I had to brace myself on the deck above the "doghouse" and quickly crawl around to the other side when the sailors "came about." They told me not to fall in, because they wouldn't come back to pick me up until the race was over.  BRR, Bellingham Bay and San Juan waters are from the North Pacific and are COOLLLDD.) I stayed on deck on all fours or seated.

The Columbia River in Canada, where three or more rivers and streams add their waters to the mighty Columbia, not far from the Columbia Icefields.

It is here that David Thompson and his crew, working then for Hudson's Bay Company, came down into the Columbia Valley. They were fleeing from hostile Indians on  the eastern side of the mountains. Since this was not a regular crossing to the upper Columbia  Valley from the high plains, the discovery of the site verified Thompson's tentative belief that this river really was the fabled Columbia River. This realization was because here the Columbia turns abruptly back south toward the United States border just around the corner to the left from this photo & plaque erected years later.  Before this, the birthplace of the Columbia River in the United States was unknown or often mis-identified.

And what a river! As described in the book by Caxton Press, the Columbia is one of he continent's greatest. It has carried explorers' canoes and makeshift steamers, hosted spawning salmon that fought upriver all the way from the Pacific Ocean, still today is a major waterway for barges, steamships, and ocean-going ships. Also, it is one of the most beautiful rivers in the world.  Enjoy it.

MUSING, CONTINUED FROM AUG. 3

Sorry, readers. The post cut itself off after the first paragraph. Here is the rest of the post (I have a new computer with 8.1, and must be guilty of some errors).

Salmon runs this years in both the San Juans and the rivers are beyond expectation. The waters must be healthy. In my book on the Columbia River I mentioned the sea lions that hang out near the base of Bonneville Dam neat Portland and Vancouver WA. They wait for easy pickings of salmon heading for spawning streams upriver, who use the special ladders built into Bonneville to access them. Because laws prevent harming the sea lions that come in from the Pacific and go upriver, all fisheries people can do (at least mostly) is to net the most aggressive predators and truck them back down to California and turn them loose again in the Pacific. However, the sea lions are back to Bonneville almost as soon as the trucks. Well, Nature at work, I guess.

Northwesterners are opinionated about how to cook salmon; mostly they deplore cooks who over-cook the fish. Barbecuing salmon is very popular, and one cook adds brown sugar to coat them first, other teriyaki sauce, another adopts the native American way of impaling filets on leaning sticks or boards as far away from an open campfire that one could place his hand between fire and stick and not get burned. It takes hours for the fish to but taste great. The types of wood used for the fire are important. 

I found it interesting while researching the settling of the Northwest by non-natives to learn that settlers from the sea took up residence here while Midwesterners still fought with local natives. Also, with no Panama Canal yet built, explorers had to sail around South American and the infamous Cape Horn to be able to sail north all the way of what is now western Canada or Alaska. I was lucky enough to stand on Cape Horn about 12 years ago and muse about the many ships that lay beneath the turbulent waters adjacent to it. Even the supply ship for Hudson's Bay post at Vancouver WA had to sail all the way around that obstacle to get to and sail up the Columbia River to the HBC post.  What intrepid ancestors we have!

MUSING ABOUT EXPLORATIONS AND SALMON

Summer is here for sure with 80-degree temps most days in Washington State. At least it cools off at night and even need a blanket by early morning. Waters are cold -- the North Pacific sea swirling around the San Juan Islands, and in the Columbia River farther south melting glaciers feed the streams that join the river -- from the Columbia Glacier in Canada to the North Cascades Range adjacent to the river in Washington, and run-off along the Columbia Gorge from Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Hood