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About The Sunday Oregonian. (Portland, Ore.) 1881-current | View Entire Issue (July 18, 1920)
SECTION SIX Pages 1 to 10 i Automobiles, Road Trips and Northwest Highway News VOL. XXXIX. PORTLAND, OREGON, SUNDAY MORNING, JULY 18, 1920 NO. 29 OVER THE HILLS TO NEWPORT A ROUGH TRIP AND A HARD ONE Forty Miles of Dirt Road Over Coast Range Mountains, Hairpin Curves and Much New Construction Found "by Hotspot Chalmers Used as Scout Car for Logging the Route. Kilk'ru' 0 3 1 vr -4 tti -"- www 3. j x"s .-CT:.'".v. V 'VST -e I from Srwpot-f-. ' x r 4 X s.v'of k'-Ji" ' v 1 4 -4 .i A3 k V i. -JS 1 3 v- 5A 1 1 H v. ike BT L. H. GREGORY. THE time was 10:30 o'clock at night. The place, somewhere in the coast range mountains be tween Eddyville and Newport, defin ite location not fixed. Scenery, none: too dark. Dramatis personae, Ted Herlihy, territory man for the C L. Boss Automobile company, the writer and a Chalmers car in which we were logging the road from Portland to Newport and the Nye Creek beaches. For the past hour we had been feeling our way in the dark along the narrow ribbon of a mountain road that crosses from Corvallis to the sea. Sometimes another road could be perceived branching off and we would peer for a sign and di rections and finding none, trust to luck and take what looked like the main. road. For some time it had been petering out, grown up with grass. In one place it followed the railroad track, so we figured we were headed right and kept on. Presently we crossed the track at a point where construction work of some sort was in progress; wound around a few times, and then, over road Just wide enough for the car, headed up a grade. The grade became steeper,, and Herlihy threw the Chalmers into I intermediate. Still steeper and he went into, low. And then, up. up, up, 20 stories. SO stories, 1000 stories .it teemed in the dark, all the time in low; the road winding and turning hairpins through the bushes, but al ways going up. "Great Scott!" cried Herlihy. "Who put Mosier hill over here in the woods?" It may have beyn optical illusion resulting from the darkness. But the writer will say that to this hill and the steepness thereof, famed Mosier hill of sacred memory holdeth not a candle, nor the stub of a can dle, in comparison. For a mile, a mile and a half, it might have -been two miles, we ground along in low gear before reaching a summit. And then, apparently on top, had to climb some more. The descent was almost as arduous, an affair of Intermediate gear with brakes set to keep the car in con trol. Some distance further we ran into what looked like main road, coming from the right, and an hour later were in Newport. Waa It PIobkt Hillf There we mentioned this hill to such authorities as E.. J. Abbey of the Abbey hotel, Joe Patterson and 4 Martin. They appeared pained. as if suspecting us of casting as persions on their road, or inclined to attribute the adventure To the effect of darkness on city folk. They were too polite to 6ay so, of course, but well, yes, there was a hill or bo en route to Newport, but they didn't just place this particular hill we spoke of. But finally someone turned and said, and there was awe In his4roice: "Say, Joe, you don't suppose these boys could have come 'over Pioneer hill, do your ' We don't know yet whether we came over Pioneer hill, which, it seems, is no longer on the main road, or over Bunker hill. All we can swear to is that, in pitchy darkness that night, we climbed the grown parent of Mosier hill, Roberts moun tain. Hall-street hill and Mount Hood. A reward of 25 cents is offered here with to any person who can prove to us what hill we did climb. The fact remains that returning from Newport next day By daylight. we looked long and searchingly for this hill, which we supposed we would have to climb to get back to Cor vallis; but we neither climbed the hill, nor saw any sign thereof. This Incident has two morals. In their order of importance, the morals are: , Moral No. 1: The state highway commission, Oregeyi State Motor asso ciation or someone in authority, should put up a few real road signs along the road to Newport not timid. shrinking, hide-and-seek road signs of the now-you-see-me-and-now-you-don't type, but honest-to-goodness signs like those on California roads, that fly out and call you. by name in the dark. Moral No. 2: If you drive to New port, don't drive there by night. Like a good' many other Oregon roads in this period of highway con struction, traveling the road to New port at present is a good deal pleas anter to read about in .the paper than to do in person. From Portland to Newport is 146.5 miles by auto mobile, and a good -9 to 10 hours of driving, allowing of course for one meal en route. ' In fact, it is more likely to be 11 hours or even 12 hours. You can't make fast time over mountain roads not when a burst of speed may drop you down a canyon around some hair pin turn, or slam you through the windshield of a car coming from the other direction. Detours for Pavlnsr. rom Portland to Corvallis the going is easy enough. Take either the meain east side Pacific highway route to Salem or the St.. Paul route via Newberg. Ted Herlihy piloted the Chalmers by the latter route be cause of the fact that the New Era bridge on the main highway was closed for repairs just then, though now open again. The fit. Paul route is paved to Newberg, an for the most part good macadam or gravel from there to Salem. Mileage to Salem by this route. 52.7, slightly less than by the east side highway, which now has a detour for paving opera tions a short distance thie way from Salem. ' From Salem, the best route to Cor vallis at present is out the Riverside drive from Salem to the ferry at East Independence, thence to Corvallis by the main Independence road. The east side Pacific highway out of Salem has one long detour now for paing and is otherwise quite rough. And the west side road to Independ ence, reached by crossing the bridge at Salem, is closed most of the time for paving. That leaves the River side road on the east side to the ferry as the best bet. East Side Road to Independence. To reach this Riverside road, from the center of Salem drive out South Commercial street not quite a mile to where a sign very plainly indicates "To Riverside Drive and Independ ence," and follow the sign. It is 11.2 miles to the ferry, mostly very fair going, though for some three miles quite rough. From Inde pendence to Corvallis, nearly all good macadam or gravel. . . But at Corvallis, the turning off point for Newport, prepare for a hard drive. From Corvallis to Newport Is an even 60 miles. Of this 60 miles fully 50 miles are mountain road, and 40 of the 50 miles of mountain are dirt.. More nearly 45 than - 50. And this 50 miles of mountain road, we will tell the world, is real moun tain road, not the camouflaged va riety. Narrow, winding, curving, edg ing along hillsides, climbing up can yons and descending them sharp turns by the score. On the whole, though, very good road in dry weather for mountain road, but moun tain road, nevertheless. Much of it is really in excellent condition. - ' 5 4- r'A :r xw-wwitsh, -Photos by L. H. Gregory thing but excellent condition. This crawl out and call it not to be wondered at. consider ing how long it is, the 50 miles of mountain country it traverses and the fact that it is all dirt bottom. The chief source of wonder is that it is as good as it. is. Much Construction Work. Travel over it just now is further more greatly complicated by new construction work. At more than half a dozen places along the way road crews are widening the grade or building new grade. It will be much better road next season, with much of this new construction com pleted, than it Is now, though it will still be dirt road. What makes this a hard trip for any driver from Corvallis to Newport is not so much the road itself as the length of it. We have traveled over much worse , road than this, very much worse. But when you have swung around mountain curves for 50 miles, climbed mountain hills and descended them and" kept your nerves taut along narrow stretches anH at bends looking for the car that may be approaching Just ahead, your arms day. No will be tired and your brain likewise. And much of it in any- and you will be quite willing to insurmountable obstacles in the road nothing especially spectacular to overcome, now that Pioneer hill is no longer on the main route; just 50 miles of plugging around the curves. It's an interesting trip, too, though not exactly a scenic one, for it trav erses no country of the wild craggy type. Much of it lies through large timber, much of it past fertile little glades in the mountains where pio neers have settled and made the hillsides yield them heavy returns, and much of it along unsettled stretches where the road follows some canyon or is cut out o the rounded side of a hill. A nice tcur for dry weather if you can take your own time to it and camp as you feel like it at any of a thousand and more made-to-order camping places along the route. Train Recommended Xovr. But, all things considered, includ ing road construction work, the mo torist having Newport in mind will do just as .well this season to leave his car behind and go by train. He can make the trip all right, and have no particular trouble in doing it. provided he can get the gasolin But he will enjoy the scenery a lot more from the eeat of a parlor car. Herlihy and the writer set out for Newport from Portland in the Chal noon and reached Newport at. 11:30 that night. We could have cut down the time considerably between1 Port land and Corvallis, which we left for Newport, after dinner there, at 7 o'clock. On the return we left New port at 3 P. M., and, taking consid erable time for pictures, reached Portland at 12:45 that night. Incidentally, travelers making the trip will find an excellent .place to eat at the Drift inn in Corvallis, next door to the Julian hotel. The man who runs it serves good food and serves it faet soups, sandwiches and the like. He calls himself Ka-Jarz, but he has a right to. for lie cer tainly does jazz the food along.- - From Corvallis to Philomath, ap proximately seven miles, mostly good gravel road, though with one stretch of dirt road. Out of Philomath tha road is good for another five miles to Wrens in the foothills. Mileage, .Concluded on Fag 8.)
