Day 18 – North Plains OR to Ilwaco Washington – July 17, 2011

 

Today’s Mileage: 98
Mileage to Date: 1723

We woke to the sound of rain. It seems that this summer will be a repeat of last summer when the rain followed us for four months through Alberta, the Northwest Territories, British Columbia, the Yukon and Alaska.

We packed up in the rain and headed west and then north up the coast to Ilwaco, Washington. The rain followed us the whole way. We will be staying here at Eagle’s Nest RV Resort for the next seven days. I will try to take some pictures as soon as we get a break from the rain. The current temperature is 59 F, a few degrees warmer than North Plains, Oregon.

Ilwaco is where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean. Ilwaco was first settled by Henry Feister in 1851, and was named for Elwahko Jim, the son in law of Chief Comcomly a Native American chief of the Chinookan. Ilwaco was officially incorporated on December 16, 1890.

A narrow gauge railway, Ilwaco Railway and Navigation Company, ran for over thirty years. The railroad ran north up First Street in Ilwaco.

Ilwaco became a favorite port of salmon fishermen and a transportation hub for all of Pacific County. Travelers from Oregon or inland Washington could take a steamer down the Columbia River to Ilwaco, where they could travel by stage, and later by the Ilwaco Railway and Navigation Company train, also known as the ‘Clamshell Railroad That Ran With The Tides’, to the ocean beach resorts on the Long Beach Peninsula.