Day 11 - Back to Seattle and Gumbo!

---

Day 11 - Sunday

10am - After a good nights sleep and breakfast at the Motel, we made our way back from the Bluegrass Festival. We decided to stop in at the Bonneville Dam visitors centre as part of the "educational" part of our trip! We were just in time for a short tour of the dam with one of the rangers, Danielle. She gave us a great tour and took us through the dam turbine room and explained how the fish get through the dam via a series of fish ladders when they need to go upstream to spawn. Going down stream, they do have to go through the turbines and unfortunately do get a bit shredded by the turbines, but that's only a small percentage. The downstream flow of fish was not factored into the original design, but they have since built special tubes for the fish to bypass the turbines and increase the survival rate. This keeps the conservationists happy, and the fish.

After visiting the dam which was extremely beautiful, set in the Columbia River, we decided to take a small hike up Beacon Rock. It's about 45 minutes to the top and about 15 minutes down. The trail was well made with a series of many switchbacks to make the going less steep. Getting to the top gave us a brilliant view of the Columbia river and the Gorge. Washington on one side, and Oregan on the other.

By the time we got down, we were getting pretty hungry. There weren't too many places open as it was a Sunday and we were out of town, so we pulled into the local AM/PM service station in Washougal for some American culture, that is the double cheeseburger experience from AM/PM. It filled the spot until Seattle where we would be treated to Gumbo at Aunty Bee's place.

The drive back was quite a bit slower than our drive to the gorge. It must have been just the Sunday afternoon traffic of holiday makers heading back to the city. We got back safe and sound anyway.
The Gumbo was fabulous, and it was my first chance to meet my cousins, Micah & Jordan and Uncle Neil, after at least a couple of years. They were all doing well, with Micah now graduated from college at Vanderbilt university in Nashville, and now about to continue his studies at Dental School, University of Washington. Jordan has also just finished his first year at the same university.

By this time it was really getting hot in Seattle, and over the next few days we would have a heat wave and have record temperatures of over 100 degrees fahrenheit or 38 degrees celsius. 😞

---

Photos

Heading home
I would miss the scenery of the gorge

The campsite
The mountains were quite rocky on the Washington side

Bonneville Dam
This is one of several dams along the Columbia River Gorge

Fish Ladder
This is where the fish jump up to get to the other side

Model of the dams
Here is a model of the dam plus spillways

Turbines
Huge turbines generate the electricity

Danielle on tour
Our tour guide

Danielle
Danielle told us about her interest in violin, so I played the Ashokan Farewell for her before we left and she started to cry. I didn't know I had that effect on people!

Beacon Rock
Approaching beacon rock

View from the Rock
Halfway up the rock, were were already getting spectacular views

Switch backs
You can see the switchbacks along the way.

At the top
It was a great view from the top

Railroad
A train went by with some empty carts

Heading back
The freeways are pretty big over here

Car Wash
We were back and gave the car a wash at the local Bear wash