Lothlorien Woods - Abodes of Middle Earth

White Salmon is the gateway to the Colombia River Gorge, a thrilling landscape you can walk trails through, bomb down on various river craft or opt for a bit of tranquil fishing or swimming instead. For further chasing of the salmon and trout, Klickitat and its abundant river are an hour’s drive away. East of White Salmon, between the wonderfully-named Horsethief Lake and Maryland (both around an hour away) is the Colombia Hills Historical State Park, where the story of the region and its wildlife meet in grand fashion. Try the watersports on Horsethief Lake, take guided walks to see the pictograms and petroglyphs left by native American peoples and climb the rockface of Horsethief Butte. In Maryland, meanwhile, see what eccentric pioneer Sam Hill got up to: filling a replica French château with treasures from across the globe and building a miniature Stonehenge. To see the wildlife close-up, it’s a 40-minute trip to Conboy Lake Wildlife Refuge, home to Rocky Mountain elk, bobcats and coyotes, yellow-bellied marmots and golden and bald eagles. If you want to glimpse the whole region from a great height, trails to Mount Hood and Mount Adams start around an hour away. It's a similar distance to the walks and waterfalls, lakes and rivers of the Pinchot-Gifford National Forest; visit before mid-spring to see the weird and entrancing formations of the Guler ice caves. If your wagon train is heading onwards, it's an hour and 40 minutes to Portland and four hours to Seattle.