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Wednesday, May 28, 2014

Triple Falls & Larch Mountain

4.8 miles
750 feet elevation gain

A good waterfall hike for those who want a little more oomph but nothing too tough.

You can start this hike at Oneonta Trailhead, but that's for boring people with no friends. Real men start it at Horsetail falls and get the extra 2 waterfalls + viewpoint out of it. You also get slightly more of a workout. The Oneonta trail doesn't offer much but a slightly shorter path.

You start up the 1/4 mile hill from the base of Horsetail, do the switchback thing, then you are at the top quickly and behind Ponytail falls.

The trail can never decide if it wants to stay flat or go up the entire way to Triple falls. You alternate between nice flat sections and moderate uphills, but never is the trail too steep. After passing Ponytail you wander on a flat section for a while, come to a nice overlook, and take in the last views of the gorge before you plunge upstream.

Viewpoint past Ponytail looking East, Beacon Rock and Hamilton Mtn seen on the left side

 After some more flat walking you come to a downhill across Oneonta creek at middle Oneonta falls. Cross the bridge one by one since it's a feeble bridge, then go uphill to the junction with the Oneonta trail that the lame people take. From here, turn left and go up along the creek ridge. Then you level out. Then you go up. Then you level out, then you go up. Eventually you come around a corner after a slight downhill and you are rewarded with Triple falls.

Triple falls

The woods nearby


Triple falls is a lot bigger and more impressive in person than pictures make it look, but due to how the stream flows you can't really get a good scale picture. You can wander past Triple falls to the bridge over the creek behind it for a nice look downstream. The trail continues upstream from here and it's really nice and isolated, but unless you are headed all the way to Larch Mountain there isn't anything else to do or see past Triple, so go it's time to go back. I hear this hike is great in Autumn, so I'll have to report back on that one.

The day we did this, we also decided to drive up the road to Larch Mountain and take in the views from Sherrard Point. It was a beautiful day.

Mt. Hood


Little Giants guy


One of the best pictures I've taken of Mt Hood.

Hood

Mt St. Helens to the north

Mt. Adams to the Northeast

Monday, May 26, 2014

Eagle Creek

12 miles
1650 feet elevation gain

The classic.

There isn't much to say about Eagle Creek that hasn't been said by millions. Eagle Creek is one of the most celebrated hikes in Oregon and all of the pacific northwest. Of course, that makes it extremely popular. Even on a weekday at 7am you'll find a packed parking lot.

Eagle Creek is the classic Gorge hike for a reason. It's amazing and features something for everyone. It has amazing waterfalls, high cliffs, sweeping vistas, camping options, long or short trail options, and places where stupid people have probably died.

It's also pretty easy. The grade is very mild. Even walking the 6 miles to Tunnel Falls only nets you 1000 feet of up.

I've hiked Eagle Creek several times. I like it, but honestly it's not my favorite or anything. I'm a big fan of epic sweeping views and that's the one thing Eagle Creek falls a touch short on compared to other hikes. I also don't like that it doesn't have any really viable loop options. But these are minor niggles, Eagle Creek is absolutely a great hike and absolutely worth everyone's time. I've done it in a number of conditions in all 4 seasons. Winter, Summer, Spring and Fall. I'll try to combine all trips into this one entry. If I had to pick a season, I'd pick fall or early winter. Summer is too hot, Spring is too wet. Winter has atmosphere and Fall has the most open and accessible hiking. Spring has the most impressive waterfalls though.

One of the reasons the hike is so killer is that for the first 3 miles to High Bridge, the hike pulls no punches in giving you so much to love.

You start out immediately on a cliffside next to the creek, which is bigger than some rivers at this point. After following the cliffs for a while you get to the perilous cliffs, water droplets falling on you as you cling to a railing with a steep drop off. Then you reach the open cliff, an awesome cliffside view deep into the chasm. All in the first mile or so.

Cliffside trail
After that you head into the woods for the next mile, surrounded by huge trees. At several points along the trail you have to cross some creeks and dodge some water falls. After about a mile and a half, you see a little trail to the Metlako Falls overlook. Metlako can be very lame in late summer when the water levels are low, but in spring and winter it's an impressive fall.

Metlako in Winter


Super absurd Metlako in Spring
Not half a mile later you see the cutoff trail to the bottom of Punchbowl falls. Very recommended in summer and fall, when the water levels lower and the creek isn't so strong. The water is still frigid cold and you want good footwear for the slippery rocks. If you get to the bottom by punchbowl early you get the sun streaming in and it's a thing of beauty. On other days, the hike to the bottom just isn't worth it. You can't really see around the corner of the canyon to Punchbowl unless you get cold and wet. But summer? Awesome.

Lower Punchbowl colors

Lower Punchbowl

Punchbowl Canyon with the sun

Punchbowl from the bottom

Closer in

Admiring the effects
Back up the trail you shortly come to the Punchbowl overlook. Punchbowl is a really pretty waterfall and it's easy to stand and admire it for a while. It's here most people turn around.

Punchbowl from the top
If you keep going you enter the woods again, cross a few streams and a landslide area. The trip to high bridge isn't quite the scenery extravaganza the first two miles were, but it's still great. After most of the next mile you get to the next sheer cliff and high bridge, with Loowit falls off to the side dropping into it's wonderful little round pool. Eagle Creek gets vary narrow and slides between two very steep cliff walls, and you walk right over the top. Sadly pictures just don't really show it very well.

High bridge is a great spot, and things start to taper off a bit here. The next 3 miles to Tunnel and Twister falls are not nearly as jam packed with hiking goodies. The plus side is you'll be mostly alone by now, only the real hikers go past high bridge. The trail winds into the woods, you begin to see campsites, a neat waterfall called Skoonichuk Falls is off to the left and worth taking a peek at. After a while you hit 4 and a half mile bridge, and the last of the interesting views for a while. The creek here is very calm and wonderful, and on my trip here with some friends we stopped in this pool on our way back and hung out for an hour relaxing our legs in the cold water. It's a great spot for when it's hot.

Past this you hit one big final camp, then you have to grab a free permit from a handy box because you are now officially in the Hatfield Wilderness. Now it's just a matter of walking for a while. Mile 5 is largely boring until you reach the Potholes, a section of cliff they blew out leaving weird columns on the path.

The "potholes"
Shortly after that you reach the amazing Tunnel Falls.

The tunnel and the falls

Hilarity
All of tunnel falls
You actually walk into a cave behind the falls, and it provides a cool experience, but I don't think it's quite as astonishing as some other walk behind falls, especially those in Silver Falls State Park. It's still neat though.

A good hiker walks another 1/4th of a mile along the biggest most terrifying cliff yet and is rewarded with a great lunch spot on top of Twister falls.

at the top of Twister on the creek

Looking down Twister

Twister's top

It's impossible to see all of Twister from the trail due to the cliff, you'd have to wade up the creek 100 feet below to see it all.

You can keep going from here all the way to Wahtum Lake from here, but that's for backpackers and a 14 mile hike one way. Right now you've gone 6 miles, and you have to go 6 miles back out. So have fun!

As for when to do this hike: In winter, we did this hike in late January. The conditions were not great and several paces featured uncomfortable amounts of ice. You couldn't get to High Bridge unless you had proper snow footwear, and I mean spikes. But the atmosphere in winter was astonishing. The mist, the ambiance, the lack of people, it felt like Jurassic park. Prepare for ice, and a winter escape in Eagle might be a great way to see the classic hike in a different light.


Winter in Eagle

Winter in Eagle

Where are the Dinosaurs

Unparalleled atmosphere
Summer/fall was nice. It got hot though, and the waterfalls are low flow. It's great for exploring the creeks since the water doesn't rush, but outside that the power and majesty they usually show is kind of tame here.

Spring...don't go in spring. We went there after a rainy day in march, and it was the wettest hike I have ever been on. It wasn't raining, but by the end we were soaked. Tons of water falls off the cliff in new places onto your head, several small streams that you hopped across become torrential rivers, and we couldn't reach Punchbowl because of one of these streams. But the waterfalls were RIDICULOUS. If you want to see water at it's most powerful, grab everything waterproof that you own and prepare to get wet. There are waterfalls on that hike I didn't know existed until that day.

In short, Eagle Creek is awesome. It's not my favorite, but it's up there.


Tamanawas Falls

3.5 miles
600 feet elevation gain

Tamanawas falls was the cap to an unexpected adventure. The hike itself is very very simple. We wanted to go back to Ramona falls or another hike on lolo pass road, but due to icy conditions the road was closed for the season. We decided to take a trip around the mountain instead and see this "other falls I remembered reading about"

We took the mountain pass like idiots and drove through ice and snow at high elevation for a while without chains or snow tires. Obviously we lived to tell the tale, but mountain roads on ice are not a fun drive: do not recommend. We got to Tamanawas's trailhead just short of the snow levels (thankfully) and started on our way.

Tamanawas is located on the backside of Mt. Hood. The trailhead is just a big pullout on the side of the highway. You cross a nice bridge and hike through the woods to a nice big falls. It's short, it's not hard at all, and the falls is nice. This a hike for everyone who can walk and tolerate a small hill near the end. The falls itself is big but not tall, really. The best part of our hike was that no one else was around due to the snow, and we walked to the hike through a winter wonderland. It was extremely peaceful and wonderful.






The real treat of our trip however was when we arrived in hood river for lunch, we drove up to panorama point and admired lighting I've never seen before. It was one of those "right place right time" pictures of the landscape.





Friday, May 23, 2014

Trail of Ten Falls - Silver Falls state park

8 miles
800 feet elevation gain

One of the must do hikes in Oregon, and any list of best hikes in Oregon will include this hike. I've only done it twice because it's an hour away, but both times were amazing. 

It's phenomenal because the sheer bang for the buck you get on the hike. You see at least 10 waterfalls, and almost every one would be the subject of their own hike in other parks, even in the Gorge. 8 miles of pure Oregon beauty.

I'll describe the hike from the Counter Clockwise loop starting at the South Falls. I've done this hike in late summer and early spring. If you want color, fall is when to go. If you want some serious waterfall action, go in early spring as the water levels are high. The waterfalls in spring were almost frightening but awe inspiring.

I started at South Falls, the second most impressive falls in the hike. First most impressive, if you go when water levels are high, which makes the waterfall twice as wide. You descend down the side of the cliff in the falls amphitheater and go right behind the Falls. It's a great way to start a hike.

After you reach the bottom, you follow the creek a little bit before the creek drops yet again, and you go behind it yet again, for lower south falls. Take in the view, and continue down the trail. Soon you hit the junction of north and south forks of silver creek. You head up the north fork. It's a little while before the next falls, lower north falls, comes in to view. It's one of the lesser falls, just a waterslide over some rocks. Shortly after this comes a short spur trail to the left side to Double Falls, a high but light two tiered falls. Up the trail from here is Drake Falls, a hard to see falls in a narrow slot and the least remarkable of all the falls. Keep going and soon you'll see Middle North Falls down another spur trail, and another falls you can walk behind for glorious fun.

Past this you see a junction to cut the hike into 2/3rds of the full length. That's for lame people.

The next part of the hike is kind of boring, and the longest stretch without anything interesting going on. Twin falls makes an appearance, but it's short and hard to get a good angle of. After a while though, you begin to hear it...North falls. North Falls falls dramatically over a cliff overhang, and of course you can walk behind it under the cliff. It's great. A great place to sit ad have lunch. Then you can finally leave, and above North Falls is a junction. One heads back to the trailhead, the other goes a half mile upstream to Upper North Falls, a great waterfall with a fun stream area to play around in. Then you have the boring part, a 2-3 mile walk along the road back to the parking lot. Smart people would actually do the hike in the opposite direction, seeing north falls first and getting this crappy part out of the way. Along the final boring stretch is the final falls, Winter Falls, which is only there during winter.

I'll post pictures now, because you really need to see the falls at both levels of water. Check out these differences. Don't be fooled, these make the summer falls look really lame, but they aren't, they were great. It's just that the winter/spring water levels are so absurd.

South Falls:





Middle North Falls:





Upper North Falls: 





North Falls:





Damn, my photography really improved in that year span between hikes didn't it