The Real Oregon

The Wallowa Mountains in northeast Oregon are a spectacular glaciated granite range — not a series of bumps in forested terrain like the Cascades to the west — and are best seen on foot, hiking and backpacking.

If walking, hiking, backpacking and sweating your way up a steep mountain don’t appeal to you, there’s the Wallowa Lake Tramway, a Swiss-built alpine tram that takes you 3,700 vertical feet up in comfort and style to the top of 8,150-foot Mount Howard — where you’ll find, no kidding, a restaurant. There’s also a mile or two of really easy, well-groomed trail at the summit that gives you, and grandma, the opportunity to stroll around in the thin alpine air and enjoy one of the most amazing views in Oregon.

Cost for round trip is $20 per person and worth every penny.

The tram takes off south of Joseph near Wallowa Lake.

It’s been a while since we tried Amtrak, so — feeling optimistic — we took the train back up to Eugene from our recent trip to Klamath Falls.

The bad news: We arrived home two and a half hours late. That’s on a four-hour trip. The Coast Starlight is so perpetually late on its northward run that, rumor has it, Amtrak no longer sells tickets to board the train from Eugene north. That’s probably because passengers were dying of boredom in the train stations.

The good news: The run from K Falls to Eugene is utterly spectacular. We sat transfixed in the observation car for hours as the train made its way over the Cascades, through high desert Ponderosa pine on the east side and dense, wet Douglas fir forest on the west. That’s one huge forest, with practically nothing in it except the scars of the Forest Service’s industrial tree farming.

The train track clings to high cliffs, causing passengers to gasp in delight. It goes through an abundance of tunnels and avalanche sheds.

This would make a lovely fall trip; the colors are only just beginning to show at higher elevations this year.

And we would love to go back in winter and see the mountains under snow.

If you don’t mind being late, the fare’s a bargain: $27 one way.