An hour southwest of Portland in McMinnville’s wine country stands a cathedral of flight built around a single legend: the Spruce Goose. Howard Hughes’ H-4 Hercules — eight engines, a 320-foot wingspan, built almost entirely of birch during World War II — flew exactly once, for one mile, in 1947. It’s still the largest wooden aircraft ever to leave the ground.
The Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum surrounds it with 150+ aircraft and spacecraft: a Titan II missile you can walk beneath, an SR-71 Blackbird, a replica Wright Flyer and exhibits honoring Oregon’s own aviators. The Wings & Waves Waterpark next door — where a Boeing 747 perches on the roof and waterslides pour from its fuselage — makes it a full family day trip.
Stand under that immense wing and you’ll feel it: human ambition, built by hand, at its most audacious and joyful.
