Monday, September 2, 2019

Tacoma Trio Generates Eastern Washington Pacific Northwest Power

This morning incoming email from the Tacoma Trio asked in the subject line "Still in the PNW, right?"

Via the text in the email and the photos I soon understood the premise of the question was asking if Eastern Washington was considered to be part of the Pacific Northwest.

Years ago I found myself associated with a Tacoma business called the Pacific Northwest Shop. During that association I had reason to seek an accurate definition of what was considered to be the Pacific Northwest. I do not remember if Google existed back then, but I just Googled to quickly find....

The Pacific Northwest is the region of the western United States located adjacent to the Pacific Ocean. ... Much of the Pacific Northwest consists of rural forested land; however, there are several large population centers which include Seattle and Tacoma, Washington, Vancouver, British Columbia, and Portland, Oregon.

Wikipedia has a Pacific Northwest article in which the first explanatory paragraph is even more detailed than the above one...

The Pacific Northwest (PNW), sometimes referred to as Cascadia, is a geographic region in western North America bounded by the Pacific Ocean to the west and (loosely) by the Rocky Mountains on the east. Though no official boundary exists, the most common conception includes the Canadian province of British Columbia (BC) and the U.S. states of Idaho, Oregon, and Washington. Broader conceptions reach north into Southeast Alaska and Yukon, south into northern California, and east to the Continental Divide to include Western Montana and parts of Wyoming. Narrower conceptions may be limited to the coastal areas west of the Cascade and Coast mountains. The variety of definitions can be attributed to partially overlapping commonalities of the region's history, culture, geography, society, and other factors.

So, I guess the above answers the is Eastern Washington part of the PNW question.

The text in the email left no doubt as to where in the Eastern Washington part of the PNW the Tacoma Trio had taken their parental units, with the following two illuminating sentences...

So I don’t know if you can figure it out from the pics but we were at Lincoln Rock State Park in East Wenatchee this weekend. So much fun.

The rest of the email's first paragraph detailed the vehicular malfunction woes which were part of the Eastern Washington adventure. And then additional text explained what we are seeing in the photos, such as the photo at the top is Theo and Ruby riding from their campground to the Pybus Market. I have no idea what the Pybus Market is.


And then we see Ruby and Theo learning to row a boat. The twins have a history of successfully rowing boats. The water they are floating on would be what is known as the Columbia River, perhaps the reservoir behind Rocky Reach Dam. The Columbia is a real river which flows clear, clean water, not a glorified ditch flowing polluted sludge. There are no Rockin' the River Happy Hour Inner Tube Floats on the Columbia River.

The text explaining the above photo, "View from the campsite. Ok, cabin. But it’s still camping!" That would be Theo on the left, with big brother, David, on the right.


We'll let the text in the email explain the above photo, "We toured the Rocky Reach Dam then went to the Entiat Fish Hatchery and the nice lady there who let us feed the fish told us about a cool hike called Silver Falls. We went but didn’t love it."

That does look like a rather lame waterfall. The Tacoma Trio is used to seeing BIG waterfalls, like Snoqualmie Falls. Methinks they would be ultra disappointed if they ever saw the waterfall in Wichita Falls. Analytical David would quickly opine that it was ridiculous, particularly when he figured out it was manmade and flowed out of a cemetery.


The email text explained that above Theo, David and Ruby were making electricity at the dam.

Rocky Reach Dam has a HUGE educational type museum sort of attraction one gets to experience when touring the dam. I have been told that post 9/11 one goes through some sort of security to get to the powerhouse museum part of the dam. The fish ladder at Rocky Reach is the best of that type thing I have ever seen.

And once again, photos and memories of the Pacific Northwest are making me homesick.

This month David, Theo and Ruby's Aunt Jackie and Uncle Jack get to return to the PNW for the first time in years, well, two.

I believe school starts for the Tacoma Trio this week, so I don't know when next we will get taken on a new PNW adventure. Perhaps when Aunt Jackie and Uncle Jack come to town. Maybe a pedal car tour out of Ruston Point on the new pedestrian bridge to Point Defiance...

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