Moss covered

On yet another quest for something new to do, we headed out to the Gorge to a place I knew. Years and years ago, when I still worked for Fish and Wildlife, this was one of the places I collected samples of fish. On breaks (or when I needed to take one) I walked this quick little trail and pretended I wasn't spending the day slicing open fish and weighing their gonads. That's right - I said Gonads. Bleck.

Right across and downstream from Bonneville Dam on the Washington side is a little historic place called Fort Cascades. It is an important place where the settlement of the Pacific Northwest kicked off. There used to be a fishwheel here, a townsite in the late 1800's, a military compound, etc. The trail is short - about a mile and a half, right along the river. They have numbered markers and a great brochure so you can 'follow along'.

It was pretty windy that day, but we manned up and did it anyway. What's a little wind?
At the site of a portage railroad - Quinn was quite happy about it since he was racing along the trail pretending to be, of all things, a train. He said these were 'just like' his wheels. Kept his interest.

A replica of an petroglyph found here. If it wasn't a replica, there's no way my kid would have been sitting on it.

At the river side of the trail there is a grove of trees and a lot of large rocks, left here after a huge flood in 1894. Some of them are taller than I am, and they are all covered with moss and ferns. It is surreal, and there has always been something about this place for me. Quinn loved it, too, and we spent quite a lot of time crawling on the rocks and speculating about how they got there.

Time to head for home.

But, first, a quick smooch.

It is supposed to rain the rest of the week, so after the drainage guy comes to look at our crawl space, off we go to the Gorge again, but this time to Bridal Veil falls. Can't wait.