The Palouse: Amber Waves of Grain

Rusha Sams — Tue, 19 Nov 2013 02:02:33 +0000

Although I’ve traveled to many states and most recently worked in the state of Idaho, I was unfamiliar with an agricultural area known as The Palouse. But when a colleague told me of a route that would take me through this scenic area, I jumped at the chance to see on the ground what I had seen from the air as our plane approached Spokane.

The Palouse as seen from Steptoe Butte

Traveling from Moscow, Idaho, I drove west through Pullman and then headed north on Highway 195 to Rosalia, Washington, passing through an area of unparalleled scenery — undulating hills, painted barns, and amber fields of wheat and lentils and quinoa. It’s a peaceful place of a little more than 200 miles once traversed by wagon trains and railways years ago. The Palouse now boasts the greatest concentration of wheat in America and over 30% of the world’s lentils.

I fell in love with the quiet, the occasional glimpses of tractors at work, and the landscape of curved, contrasting patches of light brown and dark brown, with waving grains in some areas, stubble left by the harvest in others, and a full sky complemented by puffy clouds and the occasional spinning blades of a wind farm on the horizon. May you, too, enjoy the journey as I saw it that day in The Palouse!

For more on the Inland Northwest, click on the Page at the top of this post.

This post is #18 for National Blog Posting Month (NaBloPoMo) 2013.

Filed under: Destination, Historic Highway, NaBloMoPo2013, Photography, Travel Tagged: farmland, Idaho, lentils, Moscow, Pullman, Rosalia, The Palouse, The Palouse Scenic Byway, Washington state, wheat

Oh, the Places We See . . . » wheat

The Palouse: Amber Waves of Grain