Forty years later, when upstream travel became a
reality, the need for able-bodied men to assist with portage, as well as towing
craft upriver, became even greater; thus, were the humble beginnings of the
settlement that eventually became known as Cascade Locks.
As early as 1875, the United States government
approved plans for a set of locks to be built on the Oregon side of the river.
Construction began in 1878 and the locks were completed in 1896, and the
town of Cascade Locks was firmly established. But all that changed in
1938 with the completion of the Bonneville Dam just three miles downriver from
Cascade Locks. The reservoir, which backed up behind the dam, inundated
the locks until today only a small remnant of cut stone that lined the walls of
the locks can be seen above the reservoir’s surface.
Early photographs of the river opposite the town
of Cascade Locks show a large rapid with many rocks protruding above the
water’s surface that has a drop of twenty-one feet. For modern-day river
runners, running this rapid would have presented only a moderate challenge, as
the river at this point is wide and there were clear paths through the jumble
of rocks. (Port)
The rapids were formed by a massive landslide
known as the Bonneville Landslide that roared down Table Mountain from the
north side of the river. Over time, the river ate away at the base of the
mountain, until finally gravity took over and sent a formidable mass of rock,
rubble, and trees cascading into the river and across it to the Oregon side,
damming it to a height of two hundred feet and three and a half miles long,
with debris forming a massive lake behind it. This geological event occurred
perhaps as late as AD 1700. (Hill)
For the first time ever, local Indians could
travel from one side of the river to the other, without getting their feet wet.
They are the ones who gave this land bridge the name Bridge of the Gods.
Eventually, the river broke through the dam and washed much of the debris
downriver. The rocks in the channel across from the town of Cascade Locks
are all that remained of that cataclysmic event.
Passing under the Bridge of the Gods, the first
business establishment I came to was the Char Burger restaurant. As I
contemplated whether to go in versus finding a motel room, I was caught up in
the vortex of baked goods, chocolate milkshakes, and salty French fries, and
the decision became a no-brainer.
I opened the doors and walked into the
restaurant and immediately spotted an empty booth on the far side of the
restaurant, with giant plate-glass windows that overlooked the Columbia River;
it had my name on it. I unloaded my pack onto one of the seats and sat my
trekking poles on top of the pack. I then looked around the restaurant to
see if there were other hikers present and to ascertain the layout of the
dining room. Only Feather, the twenty-two-year-old Swedish hiker, was
present, and he was just finishing his meal. We visited for a second; I
asked him if he was going to overnight in town or move on, and he said he was
moving on. He said he was anxious to get the trip over with and didn’t
want to waste time just hanging out in town.
Earlier in our journey when we had an
opportunity to visit, I mentioned to him that my ancestors, Ola and Anna
Andersson, came from the tiny village of Slimminge, Malmohus, in the south of
Sweden. It turned out that this village was only eighty-five miles south
of the city of Halmstad, which is Feather’s hometown. I told him that Ola
and Anna, with their five children, along with Sorenson relatives from
Copenhagen, Denmark; McKay relatives from Johnstone, Scotland; Jones relatives
from Wales; and Smithies relatives from Preston, England, all immigrated to the
United States in the 1850s and came as pioneers to Utah and converts to the
Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, more commonly known as Mormons.
Some came with wagon trains, some made the journey with handcarts, but
most walked the eleven hundred miles from Winter Quarters (near Omaha,
Nebraska) to the Valley of the Great Salt Lake.
I’m grateful for these several sets of
great-great-grandparents, who were willing to make the great sacrifice to leave
their homes, their families, their country, and most of their material wealth
to make a new life in the desert valleys of the Rocky Mountains. I am the
beneficiary of their sacrifice and hard work in taming the land and
establishing homes and communities in a desert land that no one else wanted.
Feather, along with his friend, Laptop, are both
from Halmstad. Someday, I hope to visit Sweden, to see the ancestral home
of Ola and Anna Andersson, and hopefully visit these two young men who hiked
the Pacific Crest Trail with me, and for whom I have high regard.
The restaurant was set up buffet style; with
food tray in hand, one walks along the food aisle picking and choosing items to
place on the tray, and then at the end of the aisle paying the cashier for the
items. One should never go shopping when one is hungry, especially a PCT
hiker who is perpetually hungry. I couldn’t resist the vast array of
tempting food choices and when I placed my food tray in front of the cashier,
my total came to twenty-six dollars, my most expensive meal for the entire
journey.
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