Skip to main content

Washington State Route 155 and the Coulee Corridor

Image
By
I recently took US 2 across Washington State from Leavenworth to Spokane, but decided to make a detour up to the Grand Coulee Dam. The detour took me up WA 155 from Coulee City along Banks Lake to Grand Coulee, through a place where roads meets epic geologic history. WA 155 is part of the Coulee Corridor National Scenic Byway, boasting quite a number of scenic views as it goes through the Grand Coulee.


The story of this stretch of land begins a long time ago, during the Ice Age. There was a large ice sheet known as the Cordilleran ice sheet that covered western Canada, as well as portions of Idaho, Montana and Washington State. Towards the end of this glaciation, about 12,000-15,000 years ago, a large ice dam blocked the Clark Fork River in the Idaho Panhandle, creating Glacial Lake Missoula. Glacial Lake Missoula was a massive lake 2,000 feet deep, filling the valleys of western Montana, stretching more than 200 miles. At its maximum height and extent, the lake contained more than 500 cubic miles of water. Every so often, the ice dam would fail, resulting in a large catastrophic flood, rushing across northern Idaho and eastern and central Washington, down the Columbia River, through the Columbia River Gorge, and finally poured into the Pacific Ocean at the mouth of the Columbia River.

Thundering waves and chunks of ice stripped away hundreds of feet of soil, carved  mountainsides into deep canyons, or coulees, into the underlying bedrock, deposited giant ripple marks, created the Channeled Scablands of Eastern Washington and carved the Columbia River Gorge. When Lake Missoula burst through the ice dam and exploded downstream, it did so at a rate 10 times the combined flow of all the rivers of the world and at speeds of about 65 miles an hour, draining in as little as 48 hours. This towering mass of water and ice literally shook the ground as it thundered toward the Pacific Ocean. Grand Coulee, along with Dry Falls and Palouse Falls were all were created by these flood waters.

Today, the flooding is over, but the evidence of the Missoula Floods remain. WA 155 travels alongside a canyon that was once one of the channels of the Columbia River during these floods. It makes for a nice and memorable drive as the road meanders along the east bank of the 27 mile long Banks Lake and passes by Steamboat Rock State Park. Let's take a ride now, shall we?


We start near Coulee City, where US 2 veers east through rolling hills and pastures on its way to Spokane. We're some 27 miles away from the Grand Coulee Dam at this point. A few miles southwest of here is Dry Falls, which is an ancient waterfall that was once the world's largest waterfall.

You can start to make out the canyon walls that make up the edges of the coulee. There's also some grazing land for cattle.

Riding the edge of the canyon that will follow the roadway most of the way to the town of Electric City.
I spy a grand opening...

And boom goes the dynamite. That's an incredible view.
Banks Lake to our left, canyon walls to our right.

Obligatory WA 155 shield photo.

Steamboat Rock
Heading into the Northrup Canyon. This is a good area to go hiking and even see bald eagles during the winter.

Back to Banks Lake and canyon walls.
Getting into the outskirts of Electric City...

...and arriving at the junction of WA 155 and WA 174 in Grand Coulee. Both towns are near the Grand Coulee Dam. This is where our story ends, but there is a neat engineering marvel that you should see first.
If you so desire, you can check out the Grand Coulee Dam, which is just a couple miles to the north.


Sources and Links:
Scenic Washington State 365 - Coulee Corridor National Scenic Byway
Montana Natural History Center - Glacial Lake Missoula
The Columbia River: A Photographic Journey - Missoula Floods



How to Get There:

Labels:
Location: Coulee City, WA 99115, USA

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Deer Isle Bridge in Maine

By
As graceful a bridge that I ever set my eyes upon, the Deer Isle Bridge (officially known as the Deer Isle-Sedgwick Bridge) surprisingly caught my eye as I was driving around coastal Maine one Saturday afternoon. About 35 miles south of Bangor, Maine , the Deer Isle Bridge connects the Blue Hill Peninsula of Downeast Maine with Little Deer Isle over the Eggemoggin Reach on ME 15 between the towns of Sedgwick and Deer Isle . It should be noted that Little Deer Isle is connected to Deer Isle by way of a boulder lined causeway, and there is a storied regatta that takes place on the Eggemoggin Reach each summer. But the Deer Isle Bridge holds many stories, not just for the vacationers who spend part of their summer on Deer Isle or in nearby Stonington , but for the residents throughout the years and the folks who have had a hand bringing this vital link to life.   The Deer Isle Bridge was designed by David Steinman and built by the Phoenix Bridge Company of Phoenixville,
Post a Comment
Read more

Former US Route 99 through Athlone and the last Wheeler Ridge-Sacramento corridor expressway

By
Athlone was a siding of the Southern Pacific Railroad located in Merced County on the alignment of what was US Route 99 between the cities of Chowchilla and Merced.  The Athlone corridor of US Route 99 was one of the first in San Joaquin Valley to fully upgraded to four lane expressway standards.  The Athlone expressway corridor was inherited by California State Route 99 when US Route 99 was truncated to Ashland, Oregon during June 1965.  The four-lane expressway through Athlone was the last segment of what had been US Route 99 in the Wheeler Ridge-Sacramento corridor to be bypassed by a freeway.  The Athlone expressway corridor was bypassed by the modern California State Route 99 freeway in 2016.  Despite being put on a road diet and narrowed what was the Athlone expressway corridor still displays evidence of being part of US Route 99.   Above the blog cover photo displays the Athlone expressway corridor of US Route 99 south of Merced as depicted in the July 1939 California Highways &
Post a Comment
Read more

California State Route 38

By
California State Route 38 is a fifty-nine-mile State Highway located entirety in San Bernardino County and a component of the Rim of the World Highway.  California State Route 38 begins at California State Route 18 at Bear Valley Dam of the San Bernardino Mountains and follows an easterly course on the north shore of Big Bear Lake.  California State Route 38 briefly multiplexes California State Route 18 near Baldwin Lake and branches east towards the 8,443-foot-high Onyx Summit.  From Onyx Summit the routing of California State Route 38 reverses course following a largely westward path through the San Bernardino Mountains towards a terminus at Interstate 10 in Redlands.   Pictured as the blog cover is California State Route 38 at Onyx Summit the day it opened to traffic on August 12th, 1961.   Part 1; the history of California State Route 38 California State Route 38 (CA 38) is generally considered to be the back way through the San Bernardino Mountains to Big Bear Lake of Bear Valley
Post a Comment
Read more