Loren Visits (and brings the Tulsa Heat!)

The weather in the Gorge in the summer is fabulous: virtually no chance of rain, low humidity, and temperatures in the 80s and 90s. However, each summer there are times when it gets a bit too extreme... now, for example.

The outside temperature at our house is currently 105 degrees - and that's at 1700ft elevation. I'm sure it's another 5-10 degrees hotter in White Salmon/Hood River, closer to sea level. Thank goodness for low humidity (currently 12%) or we'd be immobilized. It's hard enough to get motivated to do anything as it is.

Normally, as a result of the low humidity, all you have to do is find a nice shady spot and it will be 10-15 degrees cooler. And at night it will still drop down into the 50s. Our ritual for keeping the house cool is to open all of the windows before we go to bed, then close them all in the morning. No need for AC!

But not today. Even with a 15 degree difference in the shade, that still puts it ~90. Check out this Personal Weather Station in Trout Lake for today's data.

I blame Loren. He arrived a few days ago from Tulsa for a visit, and the weather has been hot ever since. (Actually, it was hot before he got here - but I still blame him.)

We came up with four options to cool us down:

1. Go to work. Work has AC. But of course, who wants to work on a weekend?
   
2. Run through the sprinklers. That's would be fun for at least a little while...
   
3. Jump off a bridge. The Hood River has a railroad trestle with fairly deep water below. But the Hood River is 30+ minutes away.
   
4. Wade in our OWN river.

Since the White Salmon River is glacier-fed (along with the vast majority of streams and rivers around here), it is cold all year round. Very cold. Though I don't know what the precise temperature is today, 45 degrees would not be out of the question. So we decided to walk down to our sandy beach on the White Salmon and wade, sit, or dunk ourselves in the river until we cooled down. Believe me, 45 degree water really cools you down fast!

The heat is supposed to break over the next 2 days. But why does it always have to get hot on the weekend?

- Mike (& Corinne)