Cliffs Park

Interesting mix of nature and industry. Big barges pass by close to shore as they approach the lock. Trains on both sides of the river, but train noise was not bad. No whistles, just rumbling. We camped at the base of one of the power line towers just past the end of the blacktop road. Beyond that the road was loose gravel. The lication suited us, as we needed a place to sleep on the way into Oregon.

This is a spectacular location, right below John Day Dam, with easy access and very few campers. Come in on John Day Dam Rd from Hwy 14. Ignore your GPS. Mine wanted me to come in on the gravel road (deceptively named Maryhill Hwy) from Maryhill. John Day Dam Rd is blacktop right to the camping area. An 18-wheeler, no doubt following his GPS, even drove into the camping area one day, stopped at the end of the blacktop, and proceeded to back his way out again.

I camped right at the water’s edge, between the dam and the power pylons, with an excellent view of the lock and spillway. For this area, take the gravel turn-off 100 yards before the end of the blacktop - there is a steep drop-off at the turn-off after the blacktop. There are more sites beyond the pylons, and a bathroom, for which you go straight on beyond the blacktop. There were also RVs in the blacktop parking lot at Railroad Island Park, which is above the dam on a signposted turn off John Day Dam Rd.

My site was very firm and almost level. Having a rear dinette and sofa with windows on 3 sides, I camped with my trailer’s back to the river. This was fortuitous, because the west wind was incessant, but the trailer shielded the awning side. There were no trees, so the view for solar power was perfect.

I spent hours watching the water coming through the spillway (it runs continuously in the spring and early summer, for the young salmon to get downstream), the barges locking through, and the trains. There were hundreds of pelicans floating down the river from the dam, then when they had gone about 1/2 mile, flying back to the dam and floating down again. There are fishing platforms right at the campsites, but you would need to be agile to get down the rocks to them.

The trains on either side of the river were not intrusive, and there were no horns. I rarely heard the traffic on I-84. There was constant, relaxing white noise from the spillway and the wind whistling in the power lines.

While I was here, I checked out the parks directly across on the Oregon side. Rufus landing looked OK but was crowded, and there were homeless campers in cars and old RVs at French Park.

Verizon 4G was 3 bars, -100 dB, 3 Mbps down and 6 up.

When you drive to The Dalles, take WA Hwy 14 instead of I-84. It runs close to the top of the gorge, hundreds of feet above the river, with spectacular scenery and viewpoints with information on the Corps of Discovery, the Oregon Trail and the scene prior to the dams. The gravel road (Maryhill Hwy) along the waterfront to Maryhill is worth a drive too, and the old road from Maryhill bridge to The Dalles on the Oregon side. On that road at 45.654,-120.870 is the point where the Oregon trail arrived at the Columbia River.

There are dump stations and fresh water at Port of The Dalles (free) and LePage Park ($5). Propane was low-priced at Pacer Propane in The Dalles. Avoid the Wash-N-Shop laundromat. It was cramped and crowded, and there were kids running wild and people eating at the folding tables. Also avoid the gas stations at Maryhill bridge, which were expensive and packed with traffic. There is a quiet gas/diesel station 30c/gal cheaper on the Washington side, on Hwy 97, ½ mile north of the 14/97N intersection. There are groceries and an old-fashioned hardware store (Allyn's Building Center) in Goldendale.

Same guy as below, we came back a year later this time with our new (to us) 40 ft Tiffin. This time we did not go very far down the road because it's pretty bumpy. Found an amazing spot not to far from the dam and locks, next to the power lines. The wind would blow through the power lines and make spooky sounds...
We just love this Army Corps park because it's so scenic on the river, and cliffs and we bring binoculars to watch the trains behind us and across the river, also the barges and boats. One thing we noticed as a negative this time was the wind. It can be very windy here!! But we will come back, we love this place!

We arrived and first checked out Giles French Park on the Oregon side of the Columbia river. This is just below the John Day Dam. Giles has no hook-ups but is paved with grass and trees, but it was a sunny Friday afternoon and there were quite a few RVs. And we figured more were coming because it was going to be we think the first sunny weekend this spring.

We could look across the river to the Washington side and see Cliffs Park, we noticed there were many fewer RVs and a lot of space between them on that side. We drove down-river about five miles and crossed the bridge. There is a Washington State Park called Maryhill near the bridge, it has full hookups, and the campground was full. We have stayed there in the past and it is nice but we wanted to try out our new solar panel and do some real boon-docking.

We asked the ranger at the state park how to get to Cliffs but she was a volunteer and did not know. Our GPS took us up a real sketchy backroad. We should have gone back to the highway that we were on when we crossed the bridge. About a mile or two up from the bridge is a highway the runs parallel to the river, very high above the river. Fortunately at the Dam the highway drops to about river level. There is a right turn-off to the Cliffs Park. We took it. The road is a paved 35 mile an hour road that goes by an abandoned Aluminum factory and out to the dam.

As you drive downriver from the dam the paved road turns into a rough gravel road with really soft river rock. We have a 31 ft Winnebago class A and we drove carefully about five miles an hour and had no problems. Up about a mile we picked a very private dirt, gravel and wild grass spot right on the river.

As we drove here we passed several native american fisherman along the river. We met a young Indian fishing near us from the Yakima tribe. The Indians had many, very rickety docks that they have cobbled together on the beach to fish from. There are no designated sites, and we chose a site that was above the water which was very private.

It was great! We watched the barges go up and down the river, and saw the American Queen paddle boat pass us the day we arrived. If trains bother you than Cliffs or Giles across the river may not be your spot. There are east and west going tracks on both the Washington and Oregon sides of the river. We love trains and we train-watched with our binoculars, it was great! There's probably about one train every hour during the day on each side of the river. Maybe fewer trains at night and the engineers don't blow the train whistles much and we find trains going by very soothing. On our side the train tracks are up high and maybe a couple hundred yards away. There is a highway across the river for distant car and truck sounds.

Btw, we have US cellular and it worked great, three balls of LTE! 5 megs of internet.