Burlington Northern Santa Fe Train, Yakima River, WA

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The Yakima River winds roughly 200 miles across central Washington, rising near Snoqualmie Pass in the Cascade Mountains and flowing southeast to join the Columbia River near the Tri-Cities. Along much of its course, especially through the Yakima River Canyon between Ellensburg and Yakima, the river cuts through dry basalt hills covered in sagebrush and grass. Cliffs and rolling ridges rise above the water, and the canyon is known for its quiet beauty, its blue-ribbon trout fishing, and the raptors and bighorn sheep that live along its slopes. Rail lines have followed the Yakima for well over a century. The Northern Pacific Railway built its route through the valley in the 1880s, linking the Columbia Basin with Puget Sound by way of Stampede Pass, and the line helped turn the Yakima Valley into one of the country's most productive farming regions, known for apples, hops, cherries, and wine grapes. Through a series of mergers, the Northern Pacific became part of Burlington Northern in 1970, which in turn merged with the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe in 1995 to form the Burlington Northern Santa Fe, now known simply as BNSF Railway. Today freight trains still run along the river, their long strings of cars curving with the water past steep canyon walls and open rangeland. For rail enthusiasts and travelers alike, a train moving through this landscape captures the historic tie between the railroad and the settlement of the inland Northwest, set against some of the most striking scenery east of the Cascades.