Navigation On The Columbia River
At that time, and for the entire operational life of this vessel, the Columbia River was not continuously navigable from Portland at tidewater. Instead the river was divided into reaches known as the lower, middle, and upper Columbia, each one separated by a long stretch of essentially unnavigable rapids. The reaches were like giant steps, and once a steamboat was built on a step, it could, with some danger, descend to a lower step by running the rapids. However, in general no steamboat could proceed up a step, although in some cases steamboats were dismantled and carried around the major rapids or smaller ones might be winched up by a line attached to the bank.
Read more about this topic: Annie Faxon (sternwheeler)
Famous quotes containing the words columbia and/or river:
“Although there is no universal agreement as to a definition of life, its biological manifestations are generally considered to be organization, metabolism, growth, irritability, adaptation, and reproduction.”
—The Columbia Encyclopedia, Fifth Edition, the first sentence of the article on “life” (based on wording in the First Edition, 1935)
“The river knows the way to the sea;
Without a pilot it runs and falls,
Blessing all lands with its charity.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)