Day 2 July 3, 2024 Hermiston Oregon to Vancouver Washington 210 miles
We stayed at the Best Western last night and had a great breakfast. Lots of choices. While loading the car Rob discovered the pump used to get gas out of the cans and into the tank had accidentally got turned on. The batteries were dead and so was the pump. Luckily on the way out of town we spotted a Harbor Freight so Rob bought a new one.
We decided to take the road on the Washington side of the Columbia River. We did have to get on the freeway long enough to cross the river. Once we were on the Washington side we encountered very little traffic for about 100 miles. Luckily that is also when the first gas station appeared. The mileage was under 16 mpg this time. From there the traffic and wind increased.
The river was nice and smooth for the first part. However we didn’t see any barges nor many fishing vessels. We did see a paddle wheel tour boat. Connie was ready to take a picture when a train blocked the view. We saw several trains on each side of the river. One train was full of coal. Does Washington state have any coal powered electrical plants? We saw lots of wind turbines today.
The first part of the trip took us past several large wineries. Lots of grape vines and big houses. Also some fields of grain, corn and potatoes. A couple of orchards but didn’t see an fruit on the trees. The rest of the land was dry and desert looking.
We go up and down more hills on this side as well as several small tunnels. Traffic warning signs are posted that the Hood River Bridge is restricted to passenger cars only. We didn’t need to use that bridge so all is good.
We ate lunch at a rest stop by the river. The wind was really blowing so we put the window down on the river side. That was much better.
Then a police officer pulled us over and said we were holding up traffic. Of course there are no passing lanes and no large pullouts. We said we would try to do better. No ticket thank goodness. We noticed that several vehicles going the other way had ten or more cars following. Our lucky day. The young patrolman never checked the vehicle registration but did check out our car and trailer.
We told the GPS no highways to the hotel. We saw some beautiful houses. We also came to a detour and had to figure out how to tell the GPS to reroute us. The journey seemed incredibly long. A few farms had u-pick raspberries.
We made it to the hotel about 3:30 and then on to nephew Tim’s by about 4:00. Several family members were there which was good. We all ate pizza in the backyard and caught up on the latest news. S’mores were on the menu but everyone was tired from their travels. All of us called it an early night about 9:00 PM.
Spoffords Travel 