#7: [03-Aug-11]

#6: [29-Aug-09]

#5: [13-Feb-07]

#3: [17-Apr-05]

#1: [22-Jul-00]

14-Jul-2000 -- My friend Mendalara was interested in visiting a confluence with me, so we and three of her children bundled into her car and headed north from Portland, Oregon to 46°N, 123°W, just one degree north of the first confluence I ever visited. We'd used my copy of Street Atlas USA 6.0 to plan our route, which took us north on I-5 to Longview, Washington, then back south across the Columbia River into rural Oregon.

With the help of the Street Atlas directions and my trusty GPS, we found the logging road that went nearest the confluence, parked when it looked like it got too bumpy to drive on, and started walking.

I'd been thinking about doing a GPS stash, but we hadn't brought anything to stash. However, on the walk to the confluence, we noticed a car bumper, complete with license plate, lying by the side of the track. We took a photo with the GPS in the picture (Picture 6), so unless it's been cleaned up since then, there's a "stash" at about 46 degrees, 00.059 minutes north, 123 degrees, 00.082 minutes west.

It first confluence I'd visited since SA was turned off, but the GPS accuracy wasn't that much better than I'd seen previously, perhaps because of the trees that blocked off much of our view of the sky. We came to a place where the road turned right (south), at which point the GPS said we should go south, then back west. After bushwhacking into the forest a little ways, the GPS changed its mind and said we should go north, across the logging road, and into the forest on the other side. We then played "hunt the confluence" for a while and found a spot where all but the last digit of each coordinate was zero. Good enough.

Not too long after our visit, we were disappointed to learn that someone else had gotten there first, and planned our next trip to 46°N, 121°W. We seem to have beaten any other confluence hunters to that one, anyhow.