It's with a tinge of sadness to read the news this week that the Columbia Gorge Hotel has closed. The owners cite health and financial difficulties. This historic hotel in Oregon was opened in the early 1920's and was visited, they say, by old time film stars like Rudolph Valentino, the 'it girl' Clara Bow, Myrna Loy and Jane Powell and Presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Calvin Coolidge.
We stayed there on our way through Oregon in the spring of 2002. Glenn describes it as "not our greatest hotel experience." Although the grounds were lovely and a waterfall crashes 200 feet down the gorge to the Columbia River below, we thought it was overpriced and remember it mostly for the freezing cold tile-floored bathroom, having to always find an employee to work the elevator and the grossly huge breakfasts. The menu from our visit reads:
- A bountiful array of seasonal fruits and berries
- Grandma Lallah's baked apple
- Hot apple fritters with sugar and spice
- Oatmeal with brown sugar and sweet cream
- Eggs any style
- Crispy bacon, country-style smoked pork chop, apple and maple flavored pork sausage OR fresh grilled Idaho mountain trout
- Hash browned potatoes
- Homestyle baking powder biscuits and caramelized berry blossom honey
- Stack of buttermilk pancakes with hot honey maple syrup
- Coffee
This wasn't a 'pick one or two items off the menu' situation. You got ALL that food - the only choice being between the bacon/pork and the trout - and the servings were large. Glenn says, "There was enough food on each plate to feed an army and it wasn't that appetizing anyway". Think - big fatty slabs of pork. Sadly, we didn't even get to the pancakes. The berries were lovely though!
Negatives aside, it's still a grand old hotel and I hope someone someday will bring it back to glory.
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