Methow Valley
This 66 mile side trip passes through farmland and orchards as it winds through the scenic Methow River Valley.
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Key waypoints and Main Street communities along the tour leg. Sites you do not want to miss!
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The valley conforms to the windings and twistings of the river from which it takes its name. The valley is extremely narrow, but wherever the hills draw back to form more gentle slopes, or leave level meadows beside the stream, there are orchards, houses, cultivated fields, and grazing animals. Along the road, or above or below it, runs the valley's lifeline, the main irrigation ditch. Without the water it brings...
Learn more about Methow ValleyMile: 4
The name is one version of a Native American tribal designation, Smeetheowe, and is said to mean sun. Explorer and fur trader David Thompson used this designation in 1811. The town’s one short street bordered by twin rows of lofty shade trees. A sign noting the “Bolinger Homestead 1892” hangs on an aging wood-frame building on the west side of the road. Although converted to a garage, local lore suggests...
Learn more about MethowMile: 11
The city has a store, garage, restaurant, and radio shop. Here the valley widens abruptly. To the west, the river still wets the base of the hills, but eastward from the road and river lies a gently-rolling land of hayfields and orchards.
Learn more about CarltonPoints of Interest
Old Carlton
Mile: 22
The town long focused on logging and sawmilling. It was platted as Gloversville on July 30, 1897 by H. C. Glover on whose homestead it was located. On June 29, 1899, the town was re-platted by Amanda B. Burger as Twisp. The name is a modification of the Native American word T-wapsp, the meaning of which is not known. In Twisp the Twisp River, fresh from the Cascades, joins...
Learn more about TwispMile: 202
