Portland to Hagerman, ID
Trip Start
Jun 03, 2009
1
2
21
Trip End
Jul 02, 2009
Hagerman,
Idaho,
United States
Thursday, June 4, 2009
We got away at 0700 and soon we were headed east on I-84. I never get tired of that drive along the Columbia River although I prefer SR-14 on the Washington side as it is more picturesque and besides you go through lots of tunnels along the way. The Oregon side only has one tunnel and its a short one. As I expected the temperature started going up after we came out of the Cascade Locks area and neared Hood River. By the time we got to the The Dalles it was up in the 80's and time for the A/C. There were no wind surfers today on the river but lots of fishing boats. And there was a lot of water coming over the Bonneville and John Day Dam's. And as always it is fun to look for the trains along the river on both sides. We did spot the Amtrak headed for Portland on the Washington side winding its way along. On the Oregon side we saw several freight trains along the way. At one point we were right beside a freight running east. I sure wished the Amtrak still ran on the Oregon side but that ended many years ago.
We stopped at the rest stop at Boardman and it was time as we both were having lots of trouble staying awake. I guess we needed 5 gallons of coffee this morning. Not getting a good nights sleep and being tired from 3 days of hard work before starting this trip did not help either. Anyway we continued on with the warm temps and a mostly sunny sky. As we left the Columbia River we headed across the vast expanse of farm lands and sagebrush country until finally we get to the foot of the "big hill" to start our climb from about 1000' up to 4000+ foot level. It is a pretty steep climb but the truck never down shifted so that was a good sign we had the power to do the hill with little effort. It would be a different story with the trailer behind us. The temp did not go down much and soon we were in La Grande, OR. We went in on the north end which meant we had to go through down town. I was headed for the Flying J on the south end of town but we came upon Safeway that had a good price on diesel with the discount card so we filled up there instead. When we got to Baker City we were hungry so we pulled off and hit up McD's for a hamburger. I super sized mine so I would get one of those new Coca Cola glasses they are giving away. On we went and eventually we were running with the Snake River towards the Idaho border. We crossed into Idaho around 3pm and because I forgot about losing an hour this made it later than I had planned. We were going to check with Kari in Eagle, ID to see about stopping but we were running behind so we decided we would catch them on the rebound trip.
Our day ended in Hagerman, ID at the Hageman Valley Inn. It was not much of a motel but it was off the beaten path in a small quiet town. Turned out the room was fine and the bed was wonderful so we got a really good nights sleep. A very tired day had finally come to an end...tomorrow is another day but one I'm really looking forward to.
