Update through 8-15

Long time no blog. On Sunday, Aug. 3, we drove to Portland to visit son M and his family, and stayed until Monday, Aug. 12.

We spent the week greatly enjoying the company of M&K and their 9 and 7 -year-olds. We played our ukuleles, went camping in the forest for two days, visited the Portland Art Museum, went canoeing in the Columbia River, and saw Portland's women's professional soccer team win a tight game. We had a great visit with M&K, and their children 9 and 7. K home-schools the kids, and is doing a good job of it, using a lot of online resources and local afinity groups. The kids are smart, happy, and thriving. M is doing well in his job, but the kids are clearly the priority focus for them both. Too soon, we were leaving and starting to miss them once again. 

Leaving Portland, we drove east along the Columbia River. For the next few days we'll follow the route we rode on our bike tour across the U.S. in 2013. Even without the many familiar sights and happy memories, the spectacular Columbia Gorge is one of our favorite routes.

We camped Mon. and Tues. at Hat Rock, named by Lewis and Clark on their way down the river because it looked like a hat. And it does. On Tues. we did a short hike to the rock and a short canoe paddle in the River.

Wed, Aug. 14 we continued east into Washington, back to Oregon, and then into Idaho at Lewiston, the furthest inland seaport on the Columbia system. I looked at our old transamerica cycling blog, and when we passed this way six years ago it was June and all the immense wheatfields were green. Now they are golden brown, and mostly harvested. We camped on the shore of Clearwater River near Kamiah, Idaho.

Aug. 15. Will stay a second night here.This campground has the best showers ever: roomy and clean, with enough hooks and shelves. It's a holy day, so we drove a few minutes into town to a little church with an African priest. Couldn't understand more than a few words of what he said. Two women and their cute small children made up the choir. A good breakfast in town. Found my long-lost altimeter- we're at 2700'. Not yet in the mountains. In the afternoon we took a drive on a somewhat scary gravel road out of the river valley to Nezperce, a small town with several large grain elevators. The whole area is wheatfields, larger than I could have imagined. We'd intended to put the canoe in the river, but it was too hot, then too windy, then too tired, then too late. A mostly lazy day of reading.

We're at Long Camp, a historic site. On their way to the west coast, Lewis and Clark emerged from the mountains here and prepared to travel the rest of the way by river. They buried their supplies, built dugout canoes, and lent their horses to the Nez Perce Indians. On their way back the next year, they dug up what they'd cached and waited three weeks for snow to melt before setting off across the Bitterroot Mountains.