Just when you think you have a plan for the fall, weather comes along and changes it. We were working down our list and the forecast for the coming weekend was for snow and freezing temperatures. So much for plans to view fall colors on the high desert. Luckily there is always another option. We wouldn’t want to do something extreme like stay home. We headed to the lower elevation country for a tour of the Hood River Fruit Loop, an ideal time with the fall harvest of apples, pears, peaches and such just coming on.
We stayed on the Mt. Hood National Forest. We had a wild pack of spotted owls wake us up in the night hooting and howling from all directions. Then we awoke to light snow.
We worked our way over the passes near Mt. Hood and down to the Hood River valley. There are tons of places to stop in and visit. Our first stop had five or six varieties of apples, pears and other good stuff. A guy was complaining that prices were higher than the grocery store. Kinda missing the point? I wish he would have stayed home too.
After petting the goats and enjoying a brat and a beer we moved on. A corn maze and delicious cider were in our future.
After stops at several farm stands we were well stocked. We had come this far, so we made our way a bit further north to see a friend play some familiar songs at the Moulton Falls Winery in Washington. Tom never disappoints
The day grew into night and we headed up into the forest in search of a campsite. We found one on a quiet ridgetop on the Gifford Pinchot National Forest. Snow visited again, but just a light dusting.
We started on our trip back home, but visited Bonneville Dam along the way. The first in a long line of fish barriers for salmon and steelhead on the Columbia, Snake and Salmon, it’s a bit hard to balance ‘renewable’ with the harm they cause to once thriving fish runs. Are there only really 20 years left? An interesting stop nonetheless.
See you a bit upstream…
