A walk through some of Washington’s apple boom history

I recently took a hike through some of Washington State’s apple boom history. One hundred years ago, the government in the area, decided to begin clearing a wagon trail to better access the apple orchards up in the grasslands of the Husum and White Salmon River area of Washington. Chief Jacob Hunt, or Titcamnashat, which means “Earth Thunderer”, was the local Klickitat Chief and shaman who ended up owning the land that this hike is on. The families of his tribe lived along the river, so they were given 400 acres in return for the trail, which came to be known as The Weldon Wagon Trail. The cemetery which Jacob was buried in, is also in the immediate area of this hike, and can be visited as I did, before you start the wagon trail. I absolutely loved this hike, and will probably go down as one of my favorites. I don’t know if it’s because I hadn’t been out in a while, or what, but it was just so relaxing and quiet out there. It helped that I did this in the December cold. I didn’t see another person until I got back to the car. All I could hear was a few horses neighing, the wind blowing, and birds chirping. I was certain that I would see a deer, but that didn’t happen. The fog really got heavy the higher I got, and it became very eerie out there all alone. All the old apple trees, with no leaves, and all the fog, really helped to make it a bit of a scary looking hike. Perfect setting to film a horror film. It was fantastic though. The book I have, says that it was a 3 mile hike, there and back, but it really seemed longer than that. I forgot to start my gps tracker, so I can’t confirm that. The book, and a sign along the way, said that I would eventually meet up with a road, which I think was called, Sanborn Road, but once I got to a certain point, I ran into a bunch of signs that said, “Private Property”. So I stopped there to rest and eat before heading back. I had a great time, and I highly recommend it! I plan to get back out that way eventually. There looks to be a lot of ground to explore out that way, including some of the non-restricted Mt Adams recreational area. On my way back out, I saw many people packing up their kayaks near the river. I guess the White Salmon River is heavily used by intermediate kayakers and rafters year around. Here are a few of my photos from the day. As always, you can click to view them in a larger size, and purchase prints!