COLUMBIA RIVER, MARITIME HIGHWAY

Lady Washington

 

 

This beautiful replica of Captain Gray's second ship was built at Gray's Harbor north of Astoria, Oregon, and launched in 1989. It soon became the official State Ship of Washington State. It roams the ocean and rivers that touch the state as an operating sailing ship with crew as a reminder of the first entry into the Columbia River by Gray in 1892. The Lady Washington hosts passengers or just appears at maritime events at anchor for visitors to come aboard, hear history lectures perhaps. Frequently, the ship becomes a field trip for the Northwest's school children.

 

Gray had worked with the even more famous Captain Vancouver, but the latter did not believe the Columbia entered at its present site; indeed, he and others kept looking for the ocean outlet of a large river seen far inland. They thought it might be possible to sail eastward through such an unexplored waterway and emerge in the Atlantic Ocean. Gray was not sure about this possibility, either, but had seen the entry of what he thought might be the river earlier -- a belief not shared by Vancouver. Eventually, Gray was able to return southward along the coast, found and entered the treacherous meeting of river and ocean. Of course, it did not rise anywhere near the Atlantic Ocean.

 

Despite the turbulent entrance of the river it became and still is a chosen route for seagoing ships to travel the Columbia far inland for commerce. The local Indian tribes like the Chinook had long sailed upriver for commerce. The coastal people and tribes of eastern Washington and Oregon (names today) had what today we would call a "trade fair" periodically. The eastern residents would bring cured game, crafts, and other products to trade for shells, dried fish (although they had plenty of their own, too) and sea-related items. Inter-tribal wars were suspended for these commercial meetings.

 

Today sophisticated barges haul grain from Washington and Oregon farms or river ports handling grain from as far away as Idaho (via Columbia to Snake River waterways) and even trucked -in grain from Midwest farms to waiting ships moored near Portland, Oregon. Ships from many nations bring products to Portland to be disseminated by various transportation methods to markets in the West, including such barges or smaller ships.

 

In decades past smaller barges hauled fuel oil and gas east and mostly grain west to the ports, too. The high plateaus of eastern Washington, especially, were formed by ongoing emissions of lava, creating vast fertile plains where huge grain farms thrive.

In old days, these smaller barges were loaded from the cliff-like edges of the river by chutes. At first, the chutes were of wood and a problem was the fast-moving grain hurtled down and actually caught on fire (from the friction).

 

Today several charter cruise companies operate from Portland upriver to the Snake River and on east to Lewiston, Idaho. Other varying pleasure routes exist, as well, and this trip of around six days round trip is very popular with tourists. I myself have served several of the companies as a historian making comments as the ships move along the waterway. The rather luxurious ships have comfortable cabins and service, good food, side trips by small boat or bus.  Over all this activity watch the snow-covered mountains such as Mount Hood, Mount St. Helens, Mount Adams and other lesser peaks.