We were restless after a very wet March in Olympia. It was time for a road trip. And I wanted to exercise my Leica IIIG camera and try Kodak T400CN film again. Some of these expired rolls have looked fine, but others have deteriorated. The rolls I used in Greece looked great. I should give up on this long-expired film forever, but thought I would try one last roll. I loaded a roll in the IIIG for some of the great expanses of Washington state east of the Cascades (plus an overnight in The Dalles in Oregon).
The Dalles, Oregon
The Dalles is a busy rail junction. But areas of this rail yard now have bare sections and unused tracks. Still, an interesting place. The mill became a winery?
 |
| Waiting for a horse |
Columbia Hills State Park
Cross the Columbia River, drive past Dallesport, and ascent a gravel road up into the Columbia Hills. In contrast to the forested mountains of the Columbia Gorge closer to Portland, these hills are in the rain shadow and are a dry terrain. The area is famous for wildflowers in early spring.
 |
| Dalles Mountain Ranch (50mm ƒ/1.8 Canon lens, yellow-green filter) |
Farmland and the Palouse, Washington
Head east out of Richland, and you drive through miles and miles of beautiful rich farmland. As you continue east, you enter a land of hummocky low hills composed of loess (wind-blown silt). This is the Palouse. It encompasses parts of western Idaho and central east Washington.
 |
| Rail junction, Roosevelt (Canon 50mm ƒ/1.8 thread-mount lens, orange filter) |
 |
| Pasco-Kahlotus Road north of Pasco (50mm ƒ/2 Jupiter-8 lens) |
 |
| Historic schoolhouse, Pasco-Kahlotus Road (Jupiter-8 lens) |
 |
| Silo, Kahlotus (Jupiter-8 lens, yellow filter) |
 |
| Grain terminal, Oaksdale (Jupiter-8 lens, yellow filter) |
 |
| The Grain Train, Oaksdale |
This roll of T400CN was thin, and once again, it may have been mis-development by Photoland at The Evergreen State College. I will not use their services ever again. This old T400CN is grainy, probably much more so than when it was fresh. But I still like the tonality, and the ICE scratch removal in my Nikon Coolscan 5000ED scanner is a great convenience. As a substitute, I can try Ilford XP2, which is the only C-41 black and white film still in production.
