Portland 2011 - Day Two

Day Two found us heading out (in the rain) to the Columbia River Gorge area, Multnomah Falls and Mt. Hood. I have a book called Photographing Oregon that came in handy, leading us around the area for the best places to take photos.  We stopped at Vista House first, for a great look at the Columbia River, which was several feet above flood stage.

Next was Latourell Falls. Beautiful! I hiked down to the bottom and took a photo of myself with the crashing water behind me. Then we stopped at Wakeena Falls, which was smaller than Latourell but still fantastic. 

Multnomah Falls was next and OMG, it was breathtaking! It's just massive, and with all of the rain they'd been having the amount of water coming over the top was astounding. So loud! I hiked all the way up to the bridge that goes across the upper falls, and again, it was just breathtaking. The sheer force of Mother Nature is amazing. I wish my photos from up there were a little better, but it was still overcast and rainy. But I'm still glad we went. 

Our last stop of the day was Trillium Lake. My photo book said it had a fantastic view of Mt. Hood so I was eager to go there. Now on the way there it started off sunny, but as we got closer to the mountain and climbed in elevation the cloud cover increased and the rain started really coming down. By the time we got to the lake the view of the mountain was completely obscured. :-(  But there's a happy ending to that story later. *g* 

 

And now it's time for photos! Enjoy!

( Pretty waterfalls back here! )

It's someone's special day!

A great big HAPPY BIRTHDAY to such a sweet and funny gal, wilde_moon. Shawna, sweetie, I hope you had an amazingly fantastic day filled with nothing but fun and presents and cake. {{HUGS}}