Rainier OR Oregon
Frequently Asked Questions
At the foot of the main street, on the Columbia River. Vessels running between Portland and the river mouth tie up along the edge of town, and the municipal riverfront park is steps from the landing.
Yes, and it does not take long: downtown Rainier is a few blocks. The riverfront park and the main street are both walkable from the landing, with no shuttle or taxi needed.
Settle into the riverfront park to watch the grain bulkers, car carriers and stubborn tugs hauling their log rafts, then walk the main street past the family restaurant, the tavern and the antique shops. This is a slow-paced call, not a packed itinerary.
A large cantilever bridge completed in 1930, the only crossing of the Columbia between Portland and Astoria, a stretch of nearly a hundred kilometres. Its green span towers over the town’s rooftops and serves as a landmark for boaters and photographers alike.
Yes, it is the main excursion from this call, across the river. Allow a half day to a full day depending on the stops: the visitor centres tell the story of the 1980 eruption, the forests flattened in seconds and the return of wildlife to the blast zone.
The industrial waterfront of Longview, Washington, including one of the largest pulp mills on the continent. Longview owes its existence to a timber empire that raised it from nothing in the 1920s; the industrial view has its own poetry, especially at daybreak when mist still lies on the water.
The 1805 expedition came down these same waters towards the Pacific and camped on banks you now look at from the ship’s deck. Two centuries on, the landscape described in their journals, wooded hills and water birds by the thousand, is still easy to recognise.
No, and it is better to know that in advance. Rainier has no listed monument and no famous museum: two thousand residents, one main street and a great river. The call offers a page of ordinary America, with no queues and no ticket booths.
The US dollar and English. Oregon charges no sales tax, a welcome detail in the antique shops; allow 15 to 20 percent for restaurant tipping.
A jacket: the wind on the Columbia catches people out even in summer. Comfortable shoes cover the rest, since the ground is flat between the landing, the park and the main street.
