Newport City is the town on the edge of eastern Washington, though the scale of the town is biggest in between Spokane and Sandpoint, it is really a small town where was famous against the school fire incident during my stay. The atmosphere of the town looked like an fronteer town in 1880th and really interesting. I parked a rental car in front of the station and took some pictures around there. The station is on the branch line of Burlington Northern Railroad, no passenger and only a few freight train comes. Non-used caboose located at the side of the station, and Pend Oreille Valley Railroad branched from this station toward the national border to Canada along with Pend Oreille River.
The history of Pend Oreille Valley Railroad
Line built by Idaho & Washington Northern Railroad between 1907 and 1910. Milwaukee acquired line by 1916. Newport - Metaline Falls section sold to Port of Pend Oreille following Milwaukee Road's downsizing. Shortline service began on Oct 1, 1979. Railroad managed by Kyle Railways until 1984. Newport - Dover section acquired from BNSF on March 3, 1998.
Page Top 15. Alberni Falls DamPend Oreille River
From Newport, the national highway 2 will go winding with Pend Oreille River and it means the view is really good ! The river is originated in Canada and flow to Pend Oreille Village and goes south toward New Port and turns east toward Lake Pend Oreille.
Pend Oreille River
Pend Oreille River joins with a lot of small creek and becomes big and wide, a few minutes drive from the state border, there is a dam called Alberni Falls. There was a parking place to see a good view and also you can enjoy golf around the place. I watched toward east, found the railroad bridge across the river and again I felt an impression that Pend Oreille and railroad closely related each other and it is from the backend history of the development of this area, anyway for a while I could enjoyed a fine scenary from the view point. From the dam, only a few minutes apart, I met the bridge of Priest River, so again I stopped at the bridge.
Priest River (City) is a very small town that the town area has only within 500 meter and is a first station where BNSF freight train will stop after departure from Newport. After went through the town area, soon will go across the bridge of Priest River, 100 meters wide. If you watch toward the Pend Oreille River, you can see the parallely crossing iron bridge of BNSF. The water flow was really silent and the quality of water was really good. Though it was not a sight seeing view point, I enjoyed the river view a lot.
After a while, the highway goes along with the river. Sometimes beautiful view came into my eye. The more drove toward east, the wider the Pend Oreille River and sometimes it looked like a lake. Sometimes I parked my automobile and captured by the video camera.
Thama, Laclede, Wrencoe, passed those small town, almost half of the way in between Sandpoint and Newport passed. The rive width and depth became already quite wide and deep and whenever I stopped my car, it could easily be a good place to take a picture. BNSF branch line also goes along with the river and the highway, the glittering rail told me the railway was active and sometimes a freight train slowly went toward and from Newport. Before reaching to Dover, I could see the long long bridge on the river. It has a "turning" facility in the middle of the bridge. It may be turned when the tall boart want to go through the bridge. The same type of facility, you can easily see everywhere. That was really curious for me so I captured it in the video film. The bridge is for Spokane International Railroad, currently belongs to Union Pacific. The line also start from Spokane and goes into Idaho in Kootenai county and goes toward north at the west of 95 HWY nad will cross the bridge and merge with BNSF at this point.
At that time, I drove the car around the central town, 1st Avenue, Cedar Street, 4th Avenue, Priest Street, Church Street and Main Street. Every building was limited to 3 storied at the highest and no trafic jam and not crowded, atmosphere was so nice and I captured in the video. I felt like a kind of the "will of the city" that denied everything surplus, but has minimu necessary things. I could really enjoy such kind of atmosphere of the town. I drove my rental car toward Bridge Street and planned to eat lunch there.
I went to the restaurant named "Beach House Restaurant" belonging to Edgewater Resort, the chained hotel of "THE WORLD'S LARGEST HOTEL CHAIN", where is located on the edge of the lake.
Beach House Bar & Grill Restaurant
You can enjoy the lake view through the window or open deck if the weather is fine. I ordered New York stake there and took long time to enjoy lunch with silent lake view. In the United States, public space like restaurants are totally prohibited smoking, different from Japan. But of course you can smoke out side. The stake was really good and tasty and not so expensive. The day I visited was off-season and not crowded but I guess in the mid summer many people will visit and stay here to enjoy this great lake. I changed my schedule to meet Maria again on Saturday so, I should tell Donna about this change because I heard that Donna was not at home on Friday, it means I could not see her again, but I left my message on the door to promise I would come here again and was glad to see her. I turned back toward Sandpoint and drove around the area where I had visited near Schweitzer Creek, then went onto N. Boyer street and back into the central Sandpoint.
Idaho 200 state road has a name "Pend Oreille Scenic Byway". You can easily imagine from the name indicates that you can enjoy a beautiful lake view along with the road where is a water lover's paradise. Pend Oreille Scneic Byway goes through the north-east edge of Lake Pend Oreille. The road start from the crossing of the national highway 95 and 2 at the northern Sandpoint and goes through Ponderay, Kootenai, Hope and Clark Fork, then end at the border to Montana.I started driving from 1st Avenue, then go west on Cedar Street. I charged gasoline at Chevron gas station standing on the corner of 95 and Cedar. Again, I could not try to do by myself and a stuff kindly helped me. Also it seemed to me she was unfamiliar to see Asians or Japanese, anyway worry of the gas charge gone ! I drove on the 95 HWY toward north and passed under the overpass of BNSF, curved right and went onto the Pend Oreille Scenic Byway.
Kootenai City
I went through the crossing of 95 & ID 200 straight and right after passed the crossing of the branch line of Burlington Northern Railroad, went into Ponderay, the tiny city.
The pronounciation of "Ponderay" is similar to "Pend Oreille", probably originated from Pend Oreille. Around Ponderay, you can see Spokane International Railroad on the left and Burlington Northern Railroad on the right. Spokane International Railraod will turn left toward north and connect with Canadian Pacific Railway at East Port, the city of the national border. After passed this small town, soon reached to Kootenai. You know, Kootenai is the name of the county, sometimes we can see the same name as a city name in different county. Here is a small peninsula and the west of Kootenai is Kootenai Bay and the east, Oden bay. When you passed the peninsula, then you can see Sunnyside peninsula ahead.
Sunnyside is the one of the biggest peninsula on the lake and you can imagine from its name that the lake shore is the sunny place. This good location made here as a resort place, where a lot of vilas standing. I would like to visit the southern shore and went into Sunnyside Rd. The road was not paved but the lake view covered this weak point. I parked my rental car at the shore side. I saw the diving board on the shore and remembered in the summer, 1977, I came here with friends to dive and swim. The water level was lower so the impression was a bit different, but it was really what I expected and wonderful.
While driving through Sunnyside Roard, you can go along with the edge of the peninsula and when arrived at the eastern edge, you can see Pack River Flats. Flats means the low and plain area at the mouth of a river. Pack River originated around the national border to Canada, joining with Grouse Creek, Gold Creek, Rapid Lightning Creek and Trout Creek and flows into Lake Pend Oreille. The river is totally not so wide and winding into the lake. When I visited here, though not the target place, just passed here, the scenary I saw was really really curious and mysterious to me. Especially in summer, this damp was surrounded by green and blue. That's why I tried to visit here again but unfortunately the season was not summer then the scenary was not as expected but still I could enjoy visiting here. Burlington Northern railroad goes across the edge between the river and the lake, even though the scenary was brown, when I saw the freight train went across there, I strongly felt I would like to come here again in the mid summer in near future ! If I had had enough time, I would go Hope and Clark Fork, but I decided to keep going there for the next time and went back with this wonderful Byway toward Sandpoint.
Page Top 22. Back to Spokane
Again, I parked at the City Beach and spent some time and I decided leave here, I knew I had no time to come here again. I really appreciated to this wounderful place. I hope Sandpoint can be Sandpoint forever, not to change into different type of town. I went back on the 95 National Highway toward Coeur'd Alene and merged onto the interstate freeway 90 toward Spokane. The course was same as when I said good bye to my host family and I felt sad to leave from this area but for this time, I had a strong mind to come back again. In Spokane, I went to the arena to join the event of Skate America again with my wife and really enjoyed the performance of wonderful skaters.
