East of the Mountains

After work on Friday, I joined Finishshots.com on a photo-shooting journey to the other side of the mountains and the Columbia River. Most of our journey there transpired in the dark, but fortunately our lone setback was having to put on chains on the 2WD SUV while going through what is essentially a mountain pass in the Columbia Gorge. Since I felt none of the stress of driving through treacherous conditions, I was able to gaze at the trees that the snow had frosted like Christmas cookies. It took about 5.75 hours to get there, which felt like a long time, but which made sleep at the Pasco Motel 6 all that more rewarding.

Saturday morning was clear and sunny and about 4 degrees outside. I wore three layers of my best lightweight, heat-retaining clothes, which kept me plenty warm. We were shooting the Cable Bridge Race, a road run that starts on the Kennewick side of the Columbia River, crossess the Cable Bridge to the Pasco side of the Columbia, and finishes at a huge warehouse at the Port of Pasco. The race consists of three distances (1 mile, 5K, and 10K), but they start all of the racers at the same point and time. This makes shooting pictures of the runners on the bridge difficult because of the intense congestion. This part of the shoot was amazingly difficult, even though it lasted maybe five minutes; my arm felt like it was going to fall off, my fingers froze and had difficulty working the camera, and there wasn't a single second to relax or otherwise take a break. After the last participant straggled past us, we hurried back to the car and drove as close as we could to the finish line at the Port, but Brian and I jumped out when we got stuck about a mile from our destination. I ran as fast as I could over the snow-covered roads to the finish line at the warehouse, and enjoyed being able to take more individualized, quality shots at the finish line, once the participants finally spread out and I had time to plan each shot. The setting of the finish line was the coolest I've ever seen; the beach at Seaside is pretty cool place for Hood to Coast--but only if you like huge parties with 10,000 people. Anyway, the warehouse was as big as a football field and filled with huge machines and tools; this was all pushed aside to the walls, lined with yellow police tape, creating an aisle down the center, with the post-race celebration at the far end of the warehouse. Meg would have enjoyed the idea of sipping on the hot dr. pepper, which apparently they serve as the traditional post-race celebration drink here.

After lunch at the traditional spot (Carl's Jr.) in Kennewick, we began our journey home at 11:30. The drive through the desert was fine and fast, but once we got a few miles past The Dalles snow was all around us until we got home around 6:45 that night. True, we got stuck behind snow plows for 75 minutes (making only 8 miles), and we stopped in Keizer to drop off Hal, but it was still a long trip (but fortunatley without incident or even any scares). I was able to read, but once it was dark, I was done; it sure would have been nice if I had a personal media player--a Zune would be nice--that I could have watched a movie on. Maybe Santa will bring me one for Christmas . . .