Luuit With Mild Icing

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The rain that swanned through the district last weekend put a very welcome whitecap on some local volcanoes I may have mentioned in the past. And will continue to mention in the future.

The storm dumped about two and a half inches of rain on the valley, here, but dusted just around the top of the crater of Luuit (Mt. St. Helens), here, taken from a spot along NE Killingsworth east of NE 82nd Ave.

Luuit/Mt St Helens Over SE Portland

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Wy'east wasn't the only volcano out that day, last Wednesday; Luuit made a showing too. Due to the nacre-like sky and the muddled light that the high overcast attenuated, I had to do a little push-me-pull-you in GIMP to make any detail come out.

We're going into another droughty summer, but the peaks still have the lovely snow upon.

Luuit/Mt St Helens, With Rocky Butte Lampposts

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The summit of Rocky Butte is, as I may have mentioned, Joseph Wood Hill Park. You get to the top by finding NE Rocky Butte Road off NE 92nd Avenue between Brazee and Russell Streets, or take NE Fremont St east from 82nd and follow it around the City Bible College (which was once the Hill Military Academy, the namesake of the same man who the park was named after). 

Once at the top the road goes around what appears to be a crenelation at the absolute summit: that is the centerpiece of Joseph Wood Hill Park, and where these views I've been sharing can be obtained. Now, during these pandemic seasons, the part of the loop that faces east has been closed, one presumes to prevent too many people from clustering into an ongoing superspreader event. But the park is still accessible, parking now being somewhat limited.

If you do go, mask up. 

Once within the limits of the crenelation, there is an absolute flat area with wide red-pumice paths and an old airway beacon (which is lit and rotates at night) and unparalleled views of outer eastside Portland, and a view of Wy'east only exceeded by that of the Johnsrud viewpoint near Sandy. The rock walls and seating niches are immensely charming. And the lamps on the stone pylons? Incomparable.

They even frame Luuit/Mt St Helens magnificently. 

 This is also a way you can see a lot of IKEA without actually going. Still, It's calendar-worthy.

Cargo Coming In At PDX, As Seen From Rocky Butte, with bonus Luuit

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Rocky Butte, according to Wikipedia:

...is an extinct cinder cone butte in Portland, Oregon, United States. It is also part of the Boring Lava Field, a group of volcanic vents and lava flows throughout Oregon and Washington state. The volcano erupted between 285,000 and 500,000 years ago.

Its summit is 613 feet, or 187 metres, ASL: its obstinance in the face of the Missoula floods is what caused a riffle in the alluvial flow driven by those which we know of today as the Alameda Ridge that snakes its way east-northeastward through NE Portland for several miles, defining a number of neighborhoods and the course of a historic NE Portland street known for lovely views and high property values. 

It also has gorgeous views of its own. It takes in at least two major Cascade volcanoes clearly, miles of tree-covered eastern Portland between there and downtown, beautiful stretches of the great Columbia, parts of Vancouver and Camas, and Mount Tabor, if you look the right direction. Yesterday we spent an invigorating hour on the top of it, at Joseph Wood Hill Park, where there's a viewpoint with pumice paths, and over the next handful of blog posts, I'll be sharing these views.

Yes, there will be Wy'east. Just not yet.

The long view today is centered on a landing UPS cargo jet at PDX. The industrial and commercial land going north from the line formed by Sandy Blvd and Columbia Blvd are spread out at ones' feet here; and this all just so happens to be the main approach from the east to PDX itself. You're never late to spot any given plane; just early for the next one. 

In the foreground you have Government Island bisecting the Columbia and I-205 curving along one of the spans of the Glenn Jackson Bridge. Beyond the Columbia is, of course, the slopes encompassing the riverward part of outer Vancouver's Cascade Park nabe. 

Luuit/Mount St Helens should, at this point need no introduction though, at this time of year, still snow-clad, it's on fine form.

2010 Throwback: Luuit (Mt St Helens) and NE Portland from Council Crest

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During our first few years here as permanent Portlanders, we lit up to Council Crest Park every chance we could.

For those of you unfamiliar with Portland geography and history, it's like this: Council Crest is a very high hill in SW Portland, topping out at 1,070 feet above sea level. It's got a gorgeous and long view almost all directions, the north being obscured by a lush grove of evergreens, and the south somewhat obscured by hills and neighborhoods that direction, though, on a clear day you can catch a glimpse of every Cascade volcano from Tahoma (Rainier) to Seekseekqua (Jefferson). Its name came when a group of church people met there for a conference in 1898 and thus decided to call it Council Crest; over the years, this evolved into it being called that because representatives of surrounding indigenous tribes thought it the idea high ground for meetings though, in actuality, that likely never occurred anywhere but in the vivid imaginations of colonizing settlers.

This day, in May, 2010, I made Luuit (St Helens) the star of the show. 

In the lower left, just above the tree line, is the Fremont Bridge. Just to the right of the tangle of ramps that it feeds into is a tower of Emanuel Hospital; the crane a presage to the seismic shift in development and income that was just then still incipient. The developing nacre of the Pearl District can be seen along the tree outline in the lower right.

In the middle distance, the Columbia River; beyond that the eastern suburban fringes of Vancouver, Washington. And, if you squint at the left-hand edge of Luuit there, you can just barely make out a round hump, and that's the summit of Tahoma (Rainier), which means that me and a great many Greater Seattleites were looking at the same thing at the same time, Advance Cascadia Fair.

Those practiced in that-was-then-this-is-now can probably make out all the changes in the cityscape since then.

The Lloyd District from Terwilliger Blvd

3721There is an area of town called the Lloyd District, and it's undergone some changes over the years.

Generally speaking, this area of town centers along NE Broadway and Weidler, and goes from Williams Avenue on the west to about 15th Avenue on the east. It's spiritual heart is the Lloyd Center Mall, which has gone through many evolutions over the years and is now in what seems to be an accelerated metamorphosis into sort of a second downtown for Portland. More high-rises, more business, fewer shops and whatnot. Even the seminal Lloyd Center itself seems to be on the decline despite some passionate rebranding over the last few years.

But this is what it looks like, today, from one of the viewpoints on Terwilliger:

That would amount to a respectable downtown in any medium-sized city anywhere else. In Portland, that's our back-up downtown in case we ever have to send the usual one in for service.

In the washed out horizon blue of the oppressively clear day, Luuit keeps its own counsel.