Colombia River

I woke up to the rip-rap of the train chugging over the tracks and the golden brown deserts of eastern Washington this morning. Ghost towns race by the window, forgotten and small in the enormous space of the high plains. Hawks sit on telephone lines and sudden reservoirs of water pop up here and there out of the dry scrub - full of water birds. And the thin grass covers the land like a veil that you can see through, highlighting each curve and fold.

I take it all in with amazement sipping on hot coffee in the dining car. Over bacon and eggs I chat with a man heading to Vashon Island to visit his grandchildren and a young Montana couple on their way to Seattle to buy a car to drive back home. Later the Colombia River appears like an apparition - a rich vein of water in the middle of the desert.

And then the land changes again - streams tumble past conifers, brown scrub slowly gives way to green, and before I know it the train is snaking through the Cascade Range. Like some sort of manifest destiny I'm suddenly on the edge of the Pacific cruising along the rim of Puget Sound as the train pulls into Seattle like a weary stagecoach....