Hood River Windsurfing: A New Geography of Play

The same gap in the Cascade Range that funneled Lewis and Clark and the Columbia River through to the Pacific also funnels wind. The Cascades divide the wet, mild climate of the coast from the hot, dry climate of the Columbia Plateau interior. In summer, air masses on the plateau heat and rise, drawing cool Pacific air inland through the only sea-level break in the Cascades. The result is a sustained, predictable, westerly wind that moves through the Columbia Gorge at speeds that regularly reach thirty to forty miles per hour, sometimes more. The Yakama knew this wind as a constant feature of their homeland for centuries. It dried fish. It made the river choppy. It was geography, not weather.

In the early nineteen eighties, a group of windsurfers discovered that this same constant wind, combined with the river's flat-water depth, made Hood River one of the best locations for the sport in the world. The community that grew around windsurfing arrived gradually, then all at once. By the late nineteen eighties, Hood River had transformed from a fruit-packing economy into one of the premier outdoor recreation destinations in the Pacific Northwest.

The windsurfers were followed by kitesurfers, mountain bikers, and climbers. The Hood River County Historical Museum, a few blocks from the waterfront, documents both the Japanese American farming community and the outdoor recreation economy in the same small building, which is a reasonable summary of the town: it holds multiple histories that do not fully acknowledge each other.

The fruit orchards are still there, working the slopes of the valley. The river still flows west. The wind still comes through the gap on summer afternoons, right on schedule, as reliable as it has been for the twelve thousand years people have been standing on this bank.