Photo courtesy of www.funbeach.com

This picturesque town of about 1,100 occupies the state’s southwest corner and is the base of Washington’s Long Beach Peninsula. It’s renowned for salmon fishing.

Surrounded by Baker Bay, the Columbia River and Pacific Ocean, the town’s rich history starts with a local Native American tribe.  Elowahka Jim, a Chinook Native and renowned sturgeon fisherman, always referred to the local settlement as ‘Elowahka Ranch,’ which was later abbreviated to Ilwaco. Earlier settlers, drawn by talk of gold, furs, free land, forests and the sea, included Spanish, Portugese, English, French and Scandinavians. In the 1850s, 640 acres was claimed by the government to create Fort Canby Military Reservation, much of which comprises today’s Cape Disappointment State Park (formerly Fort Canby State Park).

As today’s visitors stroll Ilwaco’s marina and dine in its restaurants, there are few signs of the area’s past as the transportation hub for all of Pacific County. From the 1880s through the 1920s, travelers from Oregon or inland Washington were met by the Clamshell Railroad (photographed above), “the only railroad that ran with the tides” to continue their journey up the 28-mile-long peninsula to ocean beach resorts. The railroad got its name because steam ships carrying passengers or picking up cargo could only dock in the bay at high tide, which meant the railroad’s timetable changed daily.

For more info on Ilwaco, go here and here .