Portland, the Columbia River Falls, and the Oregon Crowds

It was time for the wedding party to finally go their separate ways. Most of the guests left the day after the wedding. Now, two days after, the bride and groom left on their extended honeymoon that will include stops at Glacier National Park, and into Canada to Banff National Park. Jamie's mother needed a ride to the airport in Portland, so we drove her there this morning. She was taking all the extra wedding supplies and suitcases back with her, so our pickup just barely had room for her.

Our son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter also flew out of Portland later in the day. So we met them in the city for a little urban exploration. Our first stop was Powell's City of Books, one of Portland's most famous locations. It was crowded, and the city parking was $14. Uggggh! Then we headed to Portland's Washington Park, where Denisa wanted to see the International Rose Test Garden.

We found out that early August is a great time to see the myriad of roses in full bloom.

 

Carter wanted to have a contest to find the best rose among the 1,000 varieties they test here. Our competition included the roses with the best smell.

Of course, a rose would get extra points for the best color and pretty buds.

Extra points were awarded if a rose was multi-colored.

We didn't see all the roses in this massive garden, but we did enjoy many of them. We noticed that the gardeners were trimming some of the blooms, and Carter found an almost perfect bloom they had cut off this morning.

She had planned to take it home, as another momento from our trip. She asked the ladies trimming if she could keep it, and they told her that no roses could leave the garden. Later, we found the sign that said "removal of the roses punishable by $500.00 fine." That could have been an expensive momento!

After we ate lunch together, they left for the airport. So Mark and Denisa continued their sight-seeing around Portland. We had seen enough of the city with its expensive parking and crowds, so we headed north and east out of town towards the Columbia River Gorge. We drove down historic highway 30 to see more of the crazy crowds around Multnomah Falls. Just like in the city, the parking was impossible. So we just kept driving until we found an empty pull-off spot next to an old railroad unnel.

This was part of the Oneonta Gorge hiking trail before the fires that swept through the gorge in 2017. Now the rest of the trail was fenced off. But after the tunnel opening we could peek down the canyon to find some interesting birds that were enjoying the water without any hikers close by.

We googled their black-masked description, and determined these were cedar wax wings.

As we drove further down the narrow old highway 30, we found some open parking spots at Horsetail Falls.

This was the end-of-the-line shuttle stop for the trolley ride that took passengers to see the falls. While the trolley was expensive, it allowed some visitors to see the most famous waterfalls in the Columbia River Gorge without having to worry about finding parking spots.

While the views from the bottom of Horsetail Falls were lovely, we decided to climb up the steep path to see the waterfall above horsetail. It took us high for views above the Columbia River.

Ponytail Falls was the name of the waterfall that was directly above Horsetail Falls. If you look carefully, you can see Mark's blue shirt under the ledge of the waterfall.

We actually enjoyed Ponytail Falls more, with its cave that allowed for views from behind the water.

While we shared the view with others, it was nothing like the crowds at the easier-to-get-to waterfalls right along the road. We tried to continue our hike along the river gorge. But the burned trees spoiled some of the views.  So we returned to Ponytail Falls. We had wandered through more of God's wonders.

Then we headed back down to Horsetail Falls. Since it was a little later in the day now, the crowds here had thinned. So it was easier to get a close picture of this waterfall without people in it.

We saw the crazy crowds in the Columbia River Gorge, and this was on a week-day afternoon. It would be even worse on the weekend. In order to manage that situation, the forest service started a reservation system for the parking lot closest to Multnomah falls during the popular summer season. Starting in 2025, a reservation was required to park in the lot off Highway 84. When we tried to get a reservation earlier in the day, the earliest time available was 4:00. We went to the rec.gov website to make the $2 reservation, but didn't know if we would actually stay around long enough to use it. With our hike to Ponytail Falls, it worked out that we were there longer than expected. So we circled back on I-84 to use our reservation. We were a little disappointed when there was no ranger at the parking lot to confirm we had that reservation. But when we left our car and walked through the tunnel under the road towards Multnomah Falls, they were checking for those reservations. So we found that it was possible to park here without a reservation, but you wouldn't be allowed to actually get to the falls. It was still very crowded even at 4:00, but we finally made our way to the viewpoint to look up at the famous bridge and the falls.

Of course, we had to walk further up the gorge to get the view from the bridge. Even though this was the most famous of all the waterfalls in this waterfall-laden gorge, we're not sure that it was the most beautiful.

We could have hiked to the top of Multnomah falls, but we were in a bit of a hurry. When we started this long driving loop this morning, we had planned to also include the "fruit loop." This area of the river valley had perfect conditions for growing fruits of all types.

Since Denisa loves all kinds of fruit, and loves even more buying them directly from the people that grow them, this was an important stop in our driving tour. We enjoyed driving through the miles of orchards, with the views of the snow-capped mountains behind them. We were hurrying to get to the fruit loop, and specifically the Packers Fruit Stand before they closed at 6:00. Known for the generous samples of all their jellies and fruit products, they had already closed down their tasting stations by the time we arrived. We felt like they were hurrying us out even at 5:30, so we didn't purchase any of their peaches that were $2 each, or their cherries that were $7 per pound. Their pies were $28, and a pint of ice cream was $15, so we bought a minimum at our hurried stop.

It was a long driving day, that gave us interesting views of the mountains and the Columbia River Gorge that add to the magic of this part of Oregon. As we drove back to our trailer near Mount Hood we were tired and hungry. That's when we found out that this area had few places to eat, and none were open on a Monday evening. After a day dodging the crowds of the city and the most popular tourist attractions, we felt strangely alone in this more remote area right under Mount Hood. With our stomachs growling and after a day of crowds, we were glad to be heading home to our quiet home on wheels with a refrigerator full of options.