![\"\"](\"http:\/\/cowlesmountain.com\/Travels\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/AstoriaOr-061.jpg\")
<\/a>Our campsite is a pull-in spot overlooking a river and on the other side the golf course.\u00a0\u00a0 There is a wide mowed grass area between us and the river.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Quite a picturesque place to camp, and they clearly understood what RV’s need:\u00a0 the hookups were correctly placed to point the coach at the pretty view.\u00a0\u00a0 Most places we’ve stayed do not appear to understand that concept.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n I checked and our elevation is only 7′ above sea level, so we are keeping our fingers crossed that the Cascadia Fault won’t let go while we are camped here.\u00a0\u00a0 I should probably look for the Tsunami evac signs today so I know which way to run if it does!!\u00a0 \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n <\/p>\n I was thinking that hilltop would be a perfect place to watch the fireworks tomorrow night,\u00a0 but the last mile or so of the road getting to the top was very narrow and steep.\u00a0\u00a0 Probably impossible to get near there to watch the show tomorrow night.<\/p>\n After wandering around and enjoying an ice cream while looking at the view, we headed back down toward the riverfront to find the trolley.\u00a0 The traffic jam was gone and we drove to what Google Maps told us was the place.\u00a0\u00a0 It was not.\u00a0 It turned out to be where the trolley is stored.\u00a0 So we headed off alongside the tracks to find a stop.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n We found the westernmost stop and parked to wait for it.\u00a0\u00a0 It eventually got there and it was packed like a sardine can.\u00a0\u00a0 No one got off.\u00a0 The conductor said they were heading back to the barn to change shifts and would be right back and there should be empty seats by then.\u00a0\u00a0 That made no sense to me as there wasn’t another stop between here and the barn and there were no cars near that barn.<\/p>\n They came back a few minutes later, and as I suspected, it was still filled to capacity.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The really funny part was the sign that said you should board at the rear.\u00a0 \u00a0The trolley was on a single track and they switched directions; so when they originally pulled up, the rear was the eastern end, and when they came back from the barn, the rear was the western end.\u00a0 Maybe you just had to be there…<\/p>\n We got back into our car and headed eastward toward the center of the town.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As we were attempting to keep near the riverfront tracks, it dawned on me that someone mentioned its eastern terminus was at the Safeway store.\u00a0\u00a0 We drove there and parked then walked over to the riverfront.\u00a0\u00a0 About 10 minutes later, the trolley arrived and lots of folks got off.\u00a0 There was now plenty of room to board.\u00a0\u00a0 It’s a one-hour round trip ride for a buck.\u00a0 ($1)\u00a0 It travels right along the riverfront the whole way.\u00a0 Some of the time you are actually over the river on the boardwalk.<\/p>\n They provide a bit of history of the area and about all the old buildings you can see from the trolley.\u00a0 They also give you a bit of trivia, like where lots of movies where shot, pointing out the places and scenes from Goonies,\u00a0 Kindergarten Cop,\u00a0 Free Willy, and others I had never heard of.<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>We drove into town the next morning looking for the riverfront trolley, but we passed it and couldn’t go back due to a large traffic jam in that direction.\u00a0\u00a0 We decided to head up to the Astoria Column that we could see from the riverfront on a large hilltop.\u00a0\u00a0 They have some incredibly steep roads here.\u00a0 We heard they were the steepest roads in the country except for Lombard Street in SF,\u00a0 except these roads go straight up the hill and not switch-backs like Lombard is.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I saw one bicyclist going down the hill, and he must have been going 70 mph and wasn’t even close to being half way down yet.\u00a0\u00a0 That must have been a wild ride!\u00a0\u00a0 Hopefully his bike had the disk brakes some have.\u00a0 \u00a0 The type on my bike wouldn’t make a dent on that speed when he needs to stop.<\/p>\n<\/a>We arrived at the top of the hill and it was a spectacular view from up there.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 You could see down to the town,\u00a0 across the river and all the way to the ocean.\u00a0 \u00a0You could also see a very large river on the south side of the hill that joins the Columbia at the west end of town.\u00a0\u00a0 I wanted to climb the tower but thought better of it when I remembered my knee is not fully healed from the MCL sprain last fall, so I just took pictures of it.<\/p>\n<\/a>There were 164 steps to get to the top!!\u00a0 I thought it was neat that the little gift shop up there would sell you a balsa wood glider for $1 so you could write your name on it and sail it off the top of the tower.\u00a0\u00a0 The kids really seemed to love that.\u00a0 \u00a0You could hear them exclaiming from the top of the tower, which was about 160′ above us.<\/p>\n<\/a>This trolley is electrically driven and is powered by a large diesel generator mounted on a track dolly and pulled or pushed along.\u00a0\u00a0 There was no way to turn the trolley around, so the <\/a>motorman moved from one end to the other at each terminus. \u00a0\u00a0 They said that was much cheaper than building an <\/a>electrical overhead system that the trolley originally used.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 That reminded me that I had thought of building a small trailer with a generator to pull behind my Nissan Leaf to give it long-range capability.\u00a0 \ud83d\ude42<\/p>\n