Metaline, WA

The Metaline Falls–Nelway Border Crossing connects Metaline Falls, Washington with Nelway and Nelson, British Columbia at the Canada–US border. Access is via Washington State Route 31 on the American side and British Columbia Highway 6 on the Canadian side. This is the easternmost crossing in Washington. A newcomer can read Metaline through the overlap of its older landmarks, surrounding geography, and current places. For a newcomer, Metaline comes into focus through those concrete links among its past, landscape, and current routines. The popular belief is that Nelway is a contraction of "Nelson and Spokane highway" or the Nelson and Fort Sheppard Railway, which passed in the vicinity. Canada has had a customs office in the Nelson area since 1900, but this particular crossing did not exist until the Pend Oreille Highway was completed in 1921.