COLUMBIA RIVER GORGE SCENIC HIGHWAY plus..

In order to miss the traffic we feared this morning Sunday July 7, we headed out at 6:45 a.m. We only saw several herd of Elk and a few wandering deer on Hwy 12 West. We then traveled south on I-5 to Hwy 14 East, the Columbia River Gorge Scenic Highway (which wasn’t too scenic as the trees are too high and block the view). However we managed to stop a number of times to experience a close up look at flowers, Beacon Rock, The Columbia River Interpretive Center in Stephenson WA, as well as wind surfers, with and without parasails, who rode the rough water with style and grace as their colorful boards and sails provided this photographer with many rapid fire kodak moments.

Beacon Rock is an 848' high free standing volcanic core created out of Basalt, and is the 2nd largest free standing monolith in the northern hemisphere and fourth in the world. It is a rock climbers paradise. Lewis & Clark who explored this area in 1805, referred to it as “Beaton Rock” (for good reason). And not to be forgotten, towering 11420’ above sea level, Mount Hood, which was named after British admiral Samuel Hood, by a member of Captain George Vancouver’s discovery expedition. Our 246 mile excursion ended some 6 hours later at the Best Western in Government Camp Oregon... an interesting place in itself... Google knows the rest of the story!!!