The Bitter End (Part III)

After a busy Friday, I spent Saturday in Portland. I took light rail across town to Washington Park. I went for a walk in that park and ended up in Forest Park. Between the two parks there are over 80 miles of trails. I walk to Pittock Mansion in Forest Park. The mansion overlooks Portland and has lots of beautiful flowers.

Pittock Mansion

Flowers at Pittock Mansion.  Mt. Hood is barely visible thru the haze.

I walked back to downtown from Pittock Mansion. It was interesting walk by houses that are squeezed into small sloped lots on the hillside. I had lunch downtown and then went to Powell’s Books which is also known as Powell’s City of Books. It is a bookstore that takes up an entire city block. There is a claim that it is largest independent bookstore of new and used books in the world. It certainly is the biggest bookstore that I’ve been to. They had an incredible selection of books.

On Sunday, I went back into the Columbia River Gorge. I drove to Crown Point on the Oregon side of the Columbia and ate my breakfast while I enjoyed the view of the Gorge.

Looking west from Crown Point

After breakfast, I drove down the scenic highway looking for something to do. I thought about stopping at Latourell Falls, but the trailhead was closed due to construction. I drove to Multnomah Falls. It is the Columbia River Gorge’s most famous and popular waterfall. I was there early enough that it wasn’t too crowded. Multnomah Falls has two falls. The upper one has 542 foot drop and the lower one has a 69 foot drop. With an elevation change of 9 feet between the falls, the total height of the falls is 620 feet. The parking lot is pretty much at the base of the falls. So I basically got out and took some pictures and moved on before it got too crowded.

Multnomah Falls

Multnomah Falls

Looking down from the bridge at lower Multnomah Falls

My final stop of the trip was a hike to Wahkeena Falls and Fairy Falls. Wahkeena Falls was a short easy hike. Fairy Falls required a little bit of elevation gain, but it wasn’t too bad. After the hike, it was time to get cleaned up and go home.

Wahkeena Falls

Fairy Falls

Wahkeena Creek

And now for the Bitter End: I generally have some type of odd ball reference in my blog titles. Usually they are song titles. This blog title is no different. “The Bitter End” is a name of a song by a band called Blind Pilot who are from Portland. The Bitter End is also the name of one the bars where the Timbers Army hangs out. The original reason for being in Portland was a soccer game between the Colorado Rapids and the Portland Timbers. The Rapids are having an awful season so that reason has become secondary. The game was Friday night, but I’m putting its story at the end to fit the title. The Timbers’ fans were still friendly to us. I was told that they were going to hate us for two hours and then it is back to being friends again. The atmosphere in the stadium was great once again. The game was not so good. The Rapids lost 1-0. The Rapids dropped to last place in the Western Conference. Hence, the bitter end…

Timbers Army after the goal

P.S. – The Rapids climbed out of last place by beating Portland on the return trip on Wednesday. I was sick and missed my first home game of the season. So it is still a bitter end.