Weekending
Pomeroy, Washington is a Norman Rockwellesque farm town that doubles as NASA’s testing ground for Mars rovers.
At the end of the last Ice Age, 2,000-foot-high glacial dams shattered repeatedly, sending cataclysmic floods ripping across the Pacific Northwest. The wild water often hit 65 miles an hour, gouging lakes and razor-edged ravines, and revealing a starkly beautiful landscape of buttes and basalt-pillar colonnades. These “Channeled Scablands” are so otherworldly that NASA tested robotic rovers bound for Mars among the region’s coulees and dry waterfalls.
The torrents also eddied, piling fertile dirt several hundred feet deep, while the wind blew the lighter silt and volcanic ash into dunes. This produced the undulating farmland of Eastern Washington’s Palouse, where spotted horses once helped harvest the nation’s richest crops of wheat, barley, lentils and chickpeas. Today the “Inland Empire” stretches from northern Idaho into eastern Washington and Oregon—and photographers can’t get enough of its dramatic scenery and increasingly ramshackle pioneer barns.
“You can see the wash of the floods, northeast to southwest, corresponding with the slope of the land,” pointed out John Soennichsen, author of Washington’s Channeled Scablands Guide. “It’s just like when you leave a running hose in the driveway, it seeps and finds fingers. The Palouse seems like a magical, tiny area of the ancient terrain. It’s what’s left.”
Visit in May or June to explore rolling hills blanketed in green shoots and canary-yellow canola. By July and August, harvest golds and browns gild the area. But the charm runs year-round in Pomeroy, Washington, a small town on Highway 12 between the Snake River and the Umatilla National Forest in the Blue Mountains. It remains the only county seat designated by the United States Congress, which finally waded into a late-19th-century fray between it, Pataha, Asotin and Mentor (a flash-in-the-pan settlement).
In 1900, a saloon fire spread, burning down nearly half of Pomeroy’s business district. The plucky town rebuilt, this time with Italianate and Gothic Revival brick buildings, many of which still stand today, protected by the National Register of Historic Places. The courthouse, in particular, shines with its graceful late-Victorian architecture, topped by a statue of Justice without her blindfold—one of just 20 nationwide.
Americana collector David Webb has been livening up Main Street with vintage neon signs, creating a City Walk for Pomeroy. Check out the first 15 on display, some outside the 10,000-square-foot building that houses his private Lost Highway Museum. In addition to glowing advertisements, it features jukeboxes, arcade games, vending machines, quack medical devices, giant shoe samples and a bus motor home built by the reclusive magnate Howard Hughes in 1940.
“While the farmers prospered, the merchants never had enough money to modernize downtown. So it has architectural styles from its birth to the present day,” said Alesia Ruchert, Garfield County managing director of the Southeast Washington Economic Development Association. “Pomeroy is like stepping into a Norman Rockwell painting.”
Today around 1,425 people live in this rural town, surrounded by farms and prairie bunchgrass on steep, stony uplands. Learn more at the Eastern Washington Agricultural Museum, adjacent to the fairground. It hosts the spring Palouse Empire Threshing Bee, where contestants plow and seed a 15-acre plot using antique equipment and draft horses. Autumn’s highlight is the rodeo, complete with a chicken scramble and lawnmower races: these “Grasscars” can hit 50 mph, though the land speed record for a customized cutter stands at 134 mph!
Finish with a hike in the Blue Mountains, a gentle rampart west of Idaho's Hells Canyon, fletched by spruce and ponderosa pines. Thirty-five miles south of Pomeroy, hit the uncrowded Mount Misery Trail, a mile-high rimrock route in the Wenaha-Tucannon Wilderness Area. Watch for wildflowers into mid-summer—like calypso orchids and hummingbird-pollinated scarlet gilia—as well as Rocky Mountain elk in fall. This relatively flat amble, 17.8-miles out-and-back, threads through balds and thick groves of subalpine fir. Detour to outcrops for even better views of the area’s rugged volcanic plateau, etched into ridges and deep canyons by glacial streams.
FUEL UP
Foodies gravitate to Dayton, 30 miles southwest of Pomeroy, near the world-class wineries of the Walla Walla Valley. But the Palouse’s deep, rich soil produces great eateries across the region. Check out these four favorite stops in Pomeroy.
Coffee:
Across from the courthouse, old-fashioned Meyers Hardware contains an espresso bar, The Bean Counter, known for its homemade granitas. The 1900 building retains its balcony, sky light, 16-foot ceilings and original oiled-wood floor. It sells fishing and hunting licenses, alongside tools, paint and giftware, such as locally crafted Jarillynn Farms goat-milk soaps. Open 8am—6pm Monday through Saturday. 796 Main St, Pomeroy, WA 99347; (509) 843-3721; meyersatpomeroy.com
Breakfast:
Step back in time as locals swap stories at Tonia’s Cafe. The diner serves breakfast all day, including taco omelets, chicken-fried steaks and Belgian waffles with strawberries. Highlights include biscuits and gravy, and—later on—deep-fried pickles and the cowboy burger with mushrooms, Swiss cheese, BBQ sauce and grilled onions. Open 5am–9pm. 1412 Main St, Pomeroy, WA 99347; (509) 843-1510; facebook.com/ToniasCafe
Lunch:
Built in 1878, the Pataha Flour Mill once ground grain, fueled by the waters of Bihlmaier Creek. Now the last of its kind in Garfield County, the four-story structure houses a museum and a restaurant. The menu doesn’t list prices, as the non-profit only accepts donations of “what you can afford.” Expect big smiles and rib-sticking buffets, serving country-style classics, such as roast beef, mashed potatoes and gravy, and pie with huckleberry ice cream. Open 11am–2pm Wednesday through Saturday and for dinner 5–7pm Saturdays, followed by a praise service with Wurlitzer organ music. 50 Hutchens Hill Rd, Pomeroy, WA 99347; (509) 843-3799; patahaflourmills@gmail.com
Dinner:
The Alibi Tavern takes pride in its cold beer and piping hot, deep-fried food in farmhand-sized portions, from spicy cheese curds to coconut-breaded shrimp with Sriracha fries. This friendly spot also serves burgers (meat and veggie) and pulled pork smoked over fruit wood. Prefer a lighter bite? Go for the wild-caught salmon fillet on a ciabatta roll or an earthy-crunchy powerhouse salad with kale, broccoli, cabbage and Brussel sprouts, tossed with poblano-avocado ranch dresssing. Open 11am to 12am. Guests under 21 must leave by 9pm. 1752 Main St, Pomeroy, WA 99347; (509) 843-5138; facebook.com/TheAlibiTavern
Text and photos by Amanda Castleman