On the road to summer fun: Ten destinations within driving distance from British Columbia to Oregon to Idaho

Published 6:20 pm Monday, November 24, 2008

We live here for our summers. Boats on the lake. Swimming at the club pool, or better, in the lake. For three months the clouds clear, and we actually get less rainfall in our Puget Sound region than Phoenix.

Besides our annual respite from gray skies, we also benefit from fantastic, varied geography such as rainforests and deserts within three hours of our homes. Except for I-5, fun roads to take us along scenic roads, camping spots and favorite B&Bs. From Memorial Day to Labor Day, we should hit the highways in our new hybrids and discover the best of British Columbia to the California border. Here are 10 ideas for summer fun:

1. Southern Oregon’s Shakespeare and “The Britt.” Put your car on autopilot, turn up the sounds, and jump on I-5 headed south. Ashland, Ore., and its “sister city” Jacksonville, 15 miles away, are great places for a weeklong getaway. Ashland has at least two boasts. Its Shakespeare Festival is world-class theatre, and in case you didn’t know, while they are always presenting a play by the bard, there are typically at least two non-Shakespeare plays every day as well. Ashland’s other feature is the largest and best collection of B&Bs in the Pacific Northwest. There are more than 60 B&Bs in the area.

Jacksonville, a short drive to the northwest, is a National Historic Landmark town, with the largest and longest-running open-air music festival in the Northwest. From early June to Sept. 9, the Britt Festival brings about five nightly shows a week. This year’s line-up includes a wonderfully eclectic list: The Doobie Brothers, the Neville Brothers, Chicago, Indigo Girls, The Moody Blues, Ahmad Jamal, John Hammond, Vince Gill, David Sanborn, the Martha Graham Dance Troup, Herbie Hancock, Joan Armatrading and, touring together, the Temptations and the Four Tops.

2. The Oregon Coast. From Gearhart in the north to Bandon in the south, these 300 miles of Coast are worth a week. Golfers know Bandon Dunes as the equal to Carmel’s famous Pebble Beach, but Bandon Dunes is far more classically Scottish links in its layout.

Kids will love the 60 miles of pure 80-foot-high sand dunes between Coos Bay and Florence. Snowboarders are surfing the dunes these days. The Oregon Coast Aquarium at Newport just gets better and better, definitely worth a half-day. I also am a fan of the Sylvia Beach hotel, which should be toured as a minimum. It’s the most literary hotel in the Northwest, and features a fixed-price dinner at its Table of Contents Restaurant. Further north is Salishan Golf and Resort, pricey but the golf is wonderful, and so is the beach around Gleneden. Cannon Beach is Oregon’s best art stop, and up near Astoria, plan to spend a half-day at Fort Clatsop Living Interpretive Center where Lewis and Clark wintered 200 years ago.

3. Portland, on the quiet side. Spending a beautiful summer day in the city might not fit your fantasy of summer, but a few years ago, I discovered a great way to do Portland. I’ve always known the Rose City to be a good shopping and restaurant town, but over the Fourth of July, it seems as though everybody in Portland heads either to the coast to splash in the waves or to Bend to bicycle Sun River’s trails. Portland is empty the week of the Fourth.

We enjoyed the hot new eateries, discovered the hip design stores and boutiques in the Pearl District, idled away our warm evenings at sidewalk cafes in downtown and were able to bargain for the lowest hotel prices of the year. Don’t miss Portland’s Saturday market (also on Sundays), the famous Powell’s Bookstore, the Washington Park Rose Test Garden, 21st and 23rd N.W. shopping streets and the impressive fireworks show over the Willamette River on the evening of the Fourth.

4. Nez Perce Country. With Walla Walla’s merlots fetching higher prices than the best of Napa’s cabernets, a trip to Washington’s southeast corner makes for a really good summer getaway. The massive blue skies east of the mountains are guaranteed to make stress evaporate, and the merlots aid in the process. Since you are there anyway, tack two days onto your Walla Walla swing to cross over into Oregon and follow the signs to the town of Joseph.

Joseph is the birthplace of Chief Joseph and his father, and is the home and heartland of the Nez Perce tribe. According to the notebooks and almanacs of Lewis and Clark and their Corps of Discovery, the Nez Perce were far and away the superior tribe of North American natives. Their Wallowa Valley is gorgeous. Herds of buffalo roam the hillsides. Painted ponies, the famed appaloosas (where we get the word “Palouse”), gorge themselves in chest-high fields of grass. All this is surrounded by 10,000 foot snow-covered peaks.

There’s another reason to visit Joseph — art. David Manuel is one of America’s leading metal sculptors, and has spawned more than 50 metal artists who reside in the valley. Joseph boasts high-end art galleries as well as a Main Street lined with massive forged public art on display.

5. Stehekin and Lake Chelan: The 55-mile boat ride on the Lady of the Lake from downtown Chelan to the far end at Stehekin is an iconic Washington State experience. From de-nuded golden hills at the southeast end of the lake to the forested, canyon walls at the northwest end, the slow boat up the lake is the most enjoyable way to get a suntan.

Stehekin is the end of the road. People get around by walking or mountain-biking. You can drop a line in the lake to catch some fish — you’d better bring lots of line as Lake Chelan is the deepest lake in North America. It is possible to walk out of Stehekin, but the walk is a good full day hike up to Rainy Pass on the North Cascades Highway 20. Overnights in Stehekin are available at the North Cascade Lodge or the Silver Bay Inn.

6. Southwest British Columbia: The Okanagan to the Rockies. If you like 55-mile-long Lake Chelan, you’ll love British Columbia’s 88-mile-long Lake Okanagan. In the summer, this region from Osoyoos to Penticton to Kelowna to Vernon is a green and blue valley of grapevines and orchards with fresh fruit stands everywhere. A number of good resorts and new restaurants surround the lake.

To the east of Lake Okanagan are five or six north-south running valleys, carved by receding glaciers, separated by high mountain ranges. Visit the sophisticated town of Nelson, where everyone mountain bikes in the summer, skis in the winter and sits in the thermal springs all year round. The orchard town of Creston, just north of Idaho, is a fundamentalist Mormon town where you’ll see lots and lots of children. Farther east and to the north are Kimberley and the hot springs area of Invermere. My all-time favorite hot-springs is at Radium, inside Banff National Park.

7. Whistler in summer: Two hours north of Vancouver, you’ll find lots of activity as Whistler prepares for the Northwest’s biggest show ever, the Winter Olympics. I’m going up to keep track of all the changes, and get some fresh mountain air into my lungs.

Whistler is fun in the summer, and absolutely a family place. Inline skating and bicycling are popular, and the chair lifts operate for those of us who lust for vistas. A number of new hotels are in the works, including the spectacular new Four Seasons.

8. Vancouver Island beyond Victoria: Don’t get me wrong. I love Victoria anytime of year, and in summer its flower baskets and excitement with cruise ships and float planes set a particularly exciting tone. But there is so much more to Vancouver Island, especially in the sunny months. The Inside Passage features surprisingly warm salt water. Around Parksville and Qualicum Beach, the waters heat up over shallow sands that stretch out for almost a mile.

Across the Island on Provincial Highway 4, the beaches of the Pacific Rim National Park, especially between Tofino and Ucluelet are wonderful for beach fires, surfing and long lazy walks. Tofino and Ucluelet still have commercial salmon fleets, so if a day of fishing suits you, this is the place. Eco-touring has surpassed sport fishing there and a number of whale-watching tours will take you to the Broken Islands or up Clayoquot Sound to show you eagles, otter, sea lions and several species of whales. Oh, and you’ve got a good chance of seeing black bears on the beaches, too.

The very best resorts in the entire Pacific Northwest region will be found on or near Vancouver Island. Sooke Harbour House, 45 minutes west of Victoria is typically rated Canada’s best restaurant and its artistic rooms are treats fit for royalty. The Wickininnish Resort at Tofino is a Relais & Chateaux property, with a gorgeous 270 degree view restaurant and very modern, minimalist suites and spa. A number of other top-end resorts are along the Pacific coast including the Long Beach Inn and Resort. A quick, 15-minute ferry ride from Swartz Bay to Saltspring Island will get you to another fabulous resort — Hastings House, which set the bar for most all of the great resorts in British Columbia.

9. Washington state’s quiet southwest corner: With all the hubbub that comes with going to an ocean beach in the summertime, we in Washington are blessed with, if not the prettiest beaches, then certainly the most sparsely populated. Take Pacific County’s Long Beach Peninsula, with 28 uninterrupted miles of wide, flat sandy shoreline and room enough for every kid in King County to fly a kite. There is the largest cast iron griddle in the lower 48 states in the town of Long Beach. And there are saltwater taffy shops all along the way.

For adults and kids who like history, Wahkiakum and Pacific County are a treasure trove of turn-of-the-other-century points of interest. In Grays River, eight miles west of Skamokowa you can drive or walk the only covered bridge in the state of Washington. In Oysterville at the northern tip of the Long Beach Peninsula, the collection of clapboard homes there all date to the late 1800s and first decade of 1900. In Seaview, you can enjoy the first real B&B in the Northwest — The Shelburne Inn, with its wonderful collection of claw-foot shower tubs and oak furniture. At Cape Disappointment the Lewis & Clark Interpretive Center adds to the story of the exploration of the mouth of the Columbia River. And in Rosburg, a quarter-mile off State Route 4, is one of my favorite B&Bs—The Farm on Grays River. The innkeepers, Georg(ene) and Bob Scott, keep sheep and lambs, an impressive array of fowl, a dog and a cat, and are busy attracting birds with a number of feeders. Georg cooks everything on her wood-burning stove and oven.

10. McCall is calling: Central Idaho is “River of No Return” country, as rustic and unpopulated as any recreational land around. And things are hopping there these days. Payette Lake has famous trout fishing, lots of roped-off swimming beaches, boat rentals, and river-running streams. The village itself is still small and sane, with the typical pancake house and brewpub you would expect.

Tamarack Resort, the first Four Seasons recreational resort built in the Northwest for awhile, is a magnet drawing in money and empty nesters looking at retirement options. That might be a good enough excuse to drive over and see what’s new in this underdeveloped corner of Idaho.