Washington State Region Essay

Washington is a wonderful place with different regions, each with its own unique geography. There are five regions; Coastal Region, Puget Sound Lowlands, Cascade Region, Columbia Plateau, and the Rocky Mountains or Okanagan Region. There are many remarkable things about these regions, like the different recreational activities and landforms.

There’s a lot of nature in the Coastal Region like beaches, forests, rainforests, rivers, etc. The people who live in the Coastal Region like the outdoors because most of the activities there involve it. For example, there is hiking, camping, fishing, and water sports. The only job there is tourism, logging and commercial fishing were banned. So, the tour guides must like being outside because they have to show the tourists around. The major cities here are Port Angelas and Aberdeen. This illustrates the geography of the Coastal Region affecting the way people live by telling us that there is a lot of forest there so we can infer that people prefer being outdoors than staying in.

The Puget Sound has rich farmlands on the north and south (one of the richest farmlands in Washington.) In addition, there are deep water ports with multiple islands; that make shipping and trade accessible. I speculate that Puget Sound is used for trading the goods grown on the farms. There are also rivers, lakes, forests, and mountains. Along with nature, there are also colossal cities there like Seattle, Bellevue, Everett, Tacoma, Olympia, Mt. Vernon, Bellingham, Longview, and Vancouver. The businesses include Amazon, Microsoft, Boeing, Costco, and Starbucks. Also, we can enjoy many recreational activities there like hiking, biking, camping, boating, water sports, college and pro sports, concerts, museums, and plays. This exhibits that the people who live here can go outside or stay inside because it has both of those environments; farms for the outdoorsy people and cities for the people who prefer to stay inside.

Cascade Region has many tall mountains, rivers, and lakes. Along with those, there are 5 volcanoes which include, Mt. Baker, Mt. Rainier, Mt. St. Helens, and Mt. Adams. Since there’s a lot of nature here, there are a lot of outdoor recreational activities like hiking, camping, biking, climbing, river rafting, kayaking, and winter snow activities- skiing, snowmobiling, and sledding. There aren’t many people who live here, only a few small cities and major ones like Chelan, Ellensburg, Wenatchee, and Leavenworth. Most of the people there like to go outside to play and work. The main jobs here historically are coal mining and logging. However, both of them are banned. So, tourism is the only job there. This shows the excess of nature here makes people prefer going outside to staying indoors.

The Columbia Plateau has many landforms like dry grassland, rich farmland, dry falls, Columbia, Yakima, and Snake rivers. Also, there are many major cities like Yakima, Tri-Cities (Kennewick, Pasco, Richland), Moses Lake, Pullman, Walla Walla, and Spokane, There are also many recreational activities to do there. Hiking, biking, camping, water sports, tour fruit and wine areas are just some of the many activities people do there. The major jobs/industries there are ginormous farms and cleaning up the Hanford Clean-up site. Hanford is the most toxic place in the United States where there were many nuclear power plants that made plutonium (power source for satellites). The Palouse makes the farmland very rich. So, most of the profit for the Columbia Plateau comes from farming.

There are steep hills, the Columbia River, Spokane River, Okanagan River, and Pend Oreille River in the Okanagan Region. The recreational activities there include biking, camping, rock climbing, museums, art, rodeo, boating, water sports, and cross country skiing in the winter. The only industries there are lead and zinc mining, small farms, cattle ranching, and tourism. The people are more spread out in tiny towns. Many people here tend to like outdoor activities because of the large amount of nature. The two major cities there are Omak and Republic. Also, there are two large Native tribes, the Colville and Spokane tribes. Unfortunately, they were pushed off their ancestral lands.

In conclusion, Washington is an awesome place with a variety of regions. Like the Coastal, Puget Sound, Cascade, Columbia Plateau, and the Okanogan Regions. The regions have many wonderful things about them.