June 15th: Snake River (West of Boyer Park) to Below Lower Monumental Dam
Last night as lay in my tent going over the day's events and wondering about portaging around the dams ahead, I was looking at my map and thinking, man it looks like a long way to Portland. Yesterday when I was figuring the mileage and made the decision to go home I added it up to be actually less than 300 miles, more like 275. Now I see I made a slight error in my calculations. Slight - by about 90 miles! It is actually 360 plus miles, which means I'm going to be way off no matter how hard I work to get to Portland. Yesterday I was hoping to be near Cascade Locks by Sunday at noon. That would put me 40 miles from Portland. Now it looks like I will be lucky to get to Umatilla or Roosevelt, OR which are 180 and 120 miles respectively away from Portland. That means everything must go right...and of course 14 - 15 hour days.
I can hear my friend Jim ( Jim is my friend that goes way back to kindergarden who's meeting me in Portland on the 27th) now when I tell him. His comment will be, "Hoff, why, for all these years, do I continue to put up with your nonsense!" (Plus a few words that need not be mentioned). After he's finished his tirade, I will give him the response I always do, " Because I'm the only friend you got!" He will come back with another response that need not be mentioned, but in the end I know he'll be here and we'll make do. Although, I do feel bad about it, there's not many that would come all this way to pick up a foolish old man canoeing across the country. But again, deep down he knows I'll always be there for him when needed.
The day went well, although what breeze there was naturally was in my face, coming out of the northwest in the morning. And when I made my turn southwest, the wind did the same. Sometimes you just cannot win. I was able to make it around the next two dams, Little Goose and Lower Mounmental with little trouble. In fact I picked up some valuable mileage by bike portaging a little further around each. Tomorrow if all goes well I should be close to the Tri-Cities area in the morning which is where the Snake joins the Columbia. With a good day tomorrow and a half day on Sunday I may have a chance to get to the Roosevelt/Arlington area which puts me about 120 miles from Portland. We'll see; time for bed.
I can hear my friend Jim ( Jim is my friend that goes way back to kindergarden who's meeting me in Portland on the 27th) now when I tell him. His comment will be, "Hoff, why, for all these years, do I continue to put up with your nonsense!" (Plus a few words that need not be mentioned). After he's finished his tirade, I will give him the response I always do, " Because I'm the only friend you got!" He will come back with another response that need not be mentioned, but in the end I know he'll be here and we'll make do. Although, I do feel bad about it, there's not many that would come all this way to pick up a foolish old man canoeing across the country. But again, deep down he knows I'll always be there for him when needed.
The day went well, although what breeze there was naturally was in my face, coming out of the northwest in the morning. And when I made my turn southwest, the wind did the same. Sometimes you just cannot win. I was able to make it around the next two dams, Little Goose and Lower Mounmental with little trouble. In fact I picked up some valuable mileage by bike portaging a little further around each. Tomorrow if all goes well I should be close to the Tri-Cities area in the morning which is where the Snake joins the Columbia. With a good day tomorrow and a half day on Sunday I may have a chance to get to the Roosevelt/Arlington area which puts me about 120 miles from Portland. We'll see; time for bed.
posted by Coach at 1:25 PM
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