In the growing morning light and beneath low gray clouds, National Geographic Sea Bird sails under the Astoria-Megler Bridge on our way to a deep-water port and working dock at City of Astoria Dock, Pier #1. On the way in we pass several bulk carrier ships at anchor and riding high in the water as they wait to take on a load of cargo and head back to sea. On the dock are giant piles of logs, ready to be loaded onto ships for transport to Asia.
Following breakfast we board our comfortable motor coaches for the trip to Fort Clatsop. We are mindful that after many days of sunny weather we are experiencing the kind of weather only a bit more like Lewis & Clark and the Corps of Discovery had on a nice day here during the winter of 1805-06. At the fort a Park Ranger leads a tour of the fort and this is followed by a walk in the woods, a coastal rain forest, with our naturalists. Giant Sitka spruce trees tower above us and ferns and huckleberry vines line our path while diminutive Douglas squirrels chatter from the trees where they are eating the seeds from the spruce cones.
Back in Astoria, we wind our way up Coxcomb Hill to see the Astoria Tower, built by descendants of John Jacob Astor, the founder of Astoria. Spiraling its way up the tower is a frieze of scenes that tell the history of the area. The weather takes its toll on the tower and it is currently covered by scaffolding as a team of artists renew the paint. From our vantage point on Coxcomb Hill we have a commanding view of the countryside, including the mouth of the great Columbia River and the Pacific Ocean beyond.
Our next stop is at the Columbia River Maritime Museum, one of the finest maritime museums in America. Docents introduce us to the Columbia Bar, known as the “Graveyard of the Pacific” because of the many shipwrecks and deaths of sailors on this treacherous bar. Here where the force of the Great River of the West, the Columbia, meets the incoming swell of the Pacific Ocean, the clashing of currents and the shifting sandbars create the tumultuous waters and dangerous high waves over the bar.
In the afternoon many of us take a motor coach over the impressively high and long Astoria-Megler Bridge to the Washington side of the river. The coach follows the coast to Cape Disappointment. Here we hike through a forest up a winding trail to the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center and a sweeping view of the mouth of the Columbia River and the Pacific Ocean—not always pacific. After a stop at beautiful Waikiki Beach we head back to our ship and meet our shipmates, some of whom have enjoyed an expedition-craft tour of the Lewis & Clark National Wildlife Refuge and the John Day River.
In the evening we enjoy camaraderie and good cheer with our fellow adventurers at our social hour, Captain’s farewell, and dinner. It is a satisfying end to a wonderful day and a memorable voyage.
