Williamette River

If you come to Portland it would be awfully hard to miss this wide river snaking through the center of Portland. It is the dividing line between the Eastside and the Westside (sounds like some greasers are about to start knife fighting on the bridge)! I love the river even though when I first moved here and went down to the boat launch and accidentally put my foot in, people told me I’d lost a bit off of my life expectancy. Aside from that and a little bit of human and other waste, it’s great fun. Boating, dragon boats, SUP, flotsam & jetsam (I think) and lost phones and a body once in while make this a hub of activity.

Far be it for this California Unilocaler to address the beautiful & bountiful Williamette River of Oregon but I will try and give it justice.
Wikipedia said: «The Willamette River is a major tributary of the Columbia River, accounting for 12 to 15 percent of the Columbia’s flow. The Willamette’s main stem is 187 miles long, lying entirely in northwestern Oregon in the United States. Flowing northward between the Oregon Coast Range and the Cascade Range, the river and its tributaries form the Willamette Valley.»
Humans have been living along the Williamette for eons now – for over 10,000 years! There were once many tribal Indian villages along the lower river and in the area around its mouth on the Columbia. «Indigenous peoples lived throughout the upper reaches of the Williamette basin,» says Wikipedia.
Rich with valuable sediments deposited by flooding and fed by prolific rainfall on the western side of the Cascades, this river valley boasts one of the most fertile agricultural regions in North America. 19h-​century pioneers traveling west along the Oregon Trail flocked here, knowing that just about anything they planted would flourish in the rich soil and plentiful rain.
Just like everything else, the river has gone through plenty of changes. Now dams control the river’s flow, and vast stretches of the riverside has been channeled. Riverside areas were rip-​rapped and coated with large rock to control erosion and help to keep the banks in place. The Williamette has been dredged in spots, making it deep enough to support commercial big boat traffic, but that destroyed sensitive habitats in the process.
Also a problem: pollution. 1 Unilocal STAR DEDUCTED for that. According to the Williamette Riverkeeper, «today there is a need to address a range of pollutants, which find their way into both river water and sediments, and then into wildlife that live along the river. This can be done by strengthening water quality standards, regulations, and the existing permitting process,» although there is the always constant problem of funding to do this. National, state and local levels must all focus on the health of the Williamette, which should be paramount .
But the great Williamette flows on and through the wonderful city of Portland, Oregon, which I had the pleasure of visiting not long ago. There are all kinds of recreational activities available along the river Kayaking, fishing, boating, river-​rafting. Golf courses and mansions line its’ banks, along with house boats and amusement parks. The water seems cold and I didn’t see any swimmers but then it was early summer. I took one of the boat tours of the river on the Portland Spirit and was captivated by the beautiful river. Where I live, you have to go up to the mountains to find a river and it doesn’t really rain enough to have any creeks, so seeing the mighty Williamette and Columbia rivers was quite a treat.
People of Oregon are fortunate to have this lovely watershed passing through their lovely state.