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Mount Hood, Oregon
August 25 - September 9, 2015 

Before we started our adventure, we hung out in Portland with our friends Robert and Aaron (I know, 2 Aarons - it was confusing) who showed us around town and took us to a fabulous restaurant for dinner. They have an ADORABLE 3-legged doggy named Duncan. We love Duncan :)

Duncan and Robert

The amazing back yard of their awesome 1920s house. Sooooo cozy. Excellent spider hunting.

Love these guys - they were so kind to show us around Portland. So smart and fun to be with.

Cape Lookout

We made it out of Portland the next morning and headed to the coast - Cape Lookout State Park. Since we knew making a campfire is banned (because of a heavy forest fire season) except in designated campgrounds, we thought we'd try a regular campground so we could have a fire. It was too early to check in so we got a day pass to the beach. The coast is spectacular - I love the Pacific Ocean. We spent all afternoon hanging out on the beach... a nice welcome to Oregon.

The Atlantic lady on the Pacific.

Strange white mossy growth on the rocks.

Cute seagull, decimated crab.

Interesting that they are still finding debris on the shores from the Japanese Tsunami.

Annoyingly, the campground that we stayed in didn't, in fact, allow campfires. And was the campground equivalent to New York City. See that bald spot to the right and left of our tent? That was filled with campers about an hour after we set up. We were all about 5 feet away from each other, could hear every word, and we couldn't have campfires. It was so awkward to be in a campground that didn't allow campfires at night. Everyone seemed to go to bed early. We spent just about every moment at this campground on the beach - which was a 2-minute walk from our tent. Yay!

Excellent wind-blown trees.

Behind the campground, the forest is ravaged by logging.

Our dinner on the beach. Dehydrated feed bag.

Moon and kite.

Sunset.

Barlow Crossing Campground

We decided to head towards Mount Hood the next day - the coast is a little too crowded, and we were itching for some isolation. We went east and found the campground we stayed near when we went to Mt. Hood in 2012 - Barlow Crossing. It's a tiny 4-site Forest Service campground that allowed campfires - YAY! In 2012 we stayed just down the same road, a little more isolated, but they don't allow campfires there this year. It is a fabulous little neck of the woods and we spent a lot of time here. While there were other campers a few nights, for the most part we had it all to ourselves. Delicious.

To get there, take a major road (the 26 out of Portland) to a minor road (the 35) to a small road (the 43) to a smaller road (the 48) to a rocky gravel forest road.

I could never get tired of exploring this forest. We spent most nights here just walking around the surrounding area of the campground. So much to see. Not a soul in sight. Eerie sometimes.

The river was just down the hill from our site. Endless water supply. And Aaron loves to sit by water.

This used to be a 6-site campground, but they let 2 sites overgrow and left the picnic tables there (presumably) to freak people out.

A clump of Horsehair lichen, the weave of the forest.

Our first campfire!

The next morning I fed gray jays from my hand! These guys know the campground suckers well. They come every morning and every evening.

Lower Salmon River trail

This trail was in a landscape just like the Hoh Rainforest on the Olympic Peninsula (Washington). A stunning parade of dripping wet mossy shrubs, oversize ferns and GIGANTIC trees. The whole hike was on the path of a rocky river. It was WONDERFUL. This is probably my favorite kind of terrain in the world I've seen so far. Mount Hood is home to so many different forests, such drastically varied landscapes, it's incredible.

They grow 'em big here. Alaska: you lose.

Grebes? Loons? Not sure what these guys are.

Old Man's Beard hanging from the trees.

Started the next rainy day bird feeding. I love the way it feels on your hands :)

Tamanawas Falls trail

A wonderful (albeit popular) trail that is pretty easy and leads to a powerful waterfall. On our way in, it was really windy and we heard a crack of a huge tree partially falling. It didn't completely fall, but the booming sound reminded me of how small we are.

The boulder field was HUGE - Aaron for scale.

There was a giant flood here around 1999, wiping out the campground near the trailhead. This bridge didn't fare so well either. Entropy.

As usual...

He loved this spot. I was way too scared to go that far in. Caves make me nervous, and that waterfall sounded so strong it was frightening.

A selfie on the walk back.

And then home for some dehydrated feed bag. These things are OK tasting, but after a few days it makes your stomach rumble. It minimizes camping gear, though. No need for a cooler with ice, you only need a spoon and a pot for boiling water to prepare and eat it. Our coffee mugs collapse and double as measuring cups. Our bulk (and garbage) has come down significantly since the days we used to cook fresh food, but when we went into a grocery store for the first time we drooled in wonder over fruits and veggies and fresh meats and fresh bread.

When we made the fire that night, Aaron found a really cool piece of termite-eaten branch. The designs were so intricate it almost looked like bug art. Many areas literally looked like drawings of bugs.

Cows on the road. These free-range cows are seriously free range. I don't even know what they're eating out here.

Elk Meadows backcountry hike

This was our first backcountry hike. Great weather... a bit cold and windy, but no rain. It was only a 2.5 mile hike in, but you have to climb and climb and climb a huge ridge once you cross Newton Creek. Once we reached the meadow, we had the entire place to ourselves. Aside from one guy who was lost and asked for directions, we were completely alone. We got there at about 1:00 in the afternoon, and spent the whole day exploring the thick, tangled forest and enjoying the best views of Mount Hood you could ask for. It was so interesting to see it change with the light and become a big sun dial.

From the trailhead, you go through some forest, cross the creek and climb the ridge before you get to the meadow.

The lower forest looked very different from the upper forest.

Mount Hood is so elusive and mostly covered with sweeping clouds. It's so mountainous around it that it only appears for a moment before you lose it in the trees. When it does pop up, though - WOW!

Crossing Newton Creek in style!

Our first glimpse of the meadow!

Scoping it out, pants tucked for ticks. It was REALLY hard to walk on this stuff, too. Almost like walking in sand.

Best view of Hood EVER!

The forest in the distance was burnt down a while ago. We set up our camp on the edge of the meadow, in the THICK forest, and our landmark was that tree pointing right at it.

Our humble camp. Bearanoia.

No fires allowed, so we made do with a little alcohol stove in what was the fire mound. Pictured is the stove with the wind shield attached, but we soon discovered that sucks because it makes the pot too far from the flame to heat water properly. We improvised with rocks and tree bark later.

Gathering water at the little creek by our camp. Look how gorgeous the colors of the plants underwater are!

Bridge across the creek.

There's this old shelter on the edge of the meadow that was covered on the inside with carvings of people's names. The oldest we found was 1972, and it had names from every decade since.

KA AD
15
We just had to add our names.

It was an absolutely PERFECT place to have dinner that night.

When we got home, we looked for this spot on Google Maps and were dumbfounded that you could see the shack, fire pit and tree pointing to our camp from the satellite picture. WOW!

Mount Hood by afternoon.

Mount Hood by dusk. We kind of panicked at this moment. Everything seems all romantic and magical when the sun is shining and you're skipping along a meadow. But when the sun starts to set, all we could think of was bears. And other creatures of the night. The forest comes alive in a different way at night, and it is at times really scary. We scrambled to find the perfect place for the food bag before it was too dark to see. I don't think we have camped in this thick of a forest before. Bearanoia.

And then the sun set. Shudder. Go sleep in a forest for a night to understand the primal fear that sets in as the sun goes down.

The next morning, the first words we uttered to each other were "We survived." Heh heh. Real mountain people would LAUGH at us. But let's face it - we're city folk. This stuff is utterly thrilling. Here's Aaron making the coffee with the setting moon. It was COLD! Our fingers were numb...

Our plan was to climb up to Gnarl Ridge, but we were pretty exhausted. This is as far as we got :)

Crossing Newton Creek on the way back down... Hood in its glory.

We were so hungry after that hike, and SO SICK OF the dehydrated feed bags, we decided to have lunch at the Zig Zag Inn when we came down. A delightful lodge restaurant, just like so many you see out west. LOVED IT. Had the best cheeseburger I've ever had, and consumed it in about 2 minutes. It totally hit the spot.

We used the restaurant sink for brushing our teeth and washing our faces, but then it was back to the ol' hole in the ground. At least the hole has a nice little house around it.

With fly strips that looked like an ancient holocaust.

It was nice to be back in the Barlow Crossing campground. No one else was there, and I have this tree that I have become quite attached to.

It has bark with ridges as thick as my leg.

And it was so alive. Home to many plants, animals and insects.

Every night, I found something new in this campground.

This is where we got our firewood.

The campfire at its end.

Timothy Lake trail

It was raining pretty hard the next day, so we thought we'd take the Timothy Lake hike. We took it in 2012 and remember it being largely thick forests, so it sounded like a good idea to get some cover from the rain. It was an excellent idea. These HUGE trees make a perfect umbrella and we had a peaceful, tranquil day alone on that beautiful lake, watching the multitudes of birds who call it home. Loved it. We wore our full rain suits. Heh heh. Alaska and the Olympic Peninsula prepared us well.

Little Crater Lake in the rain.

Ridges as big as me.

Loons? Grebes?

This adorable duck actually got out of the water and hung out with us. He just kept looking at us and then stretched his legs and wings and went back to swimming. So cute. Unfortunately, we didn't see much wildlife while we were here. Maybe too rainy and cold for everyone. Such a stark contrast to the Olympic Peninsula when we saw a bear! And otters, and marmots, and seals, and just about everything else. Still, the trees were the main thing for me here. I love them so.

Dried up salamander.

The clouds here were unbelievable. I could have taken a thousand pictures. The rain didn't bother us as much as it did in Alaska. Mostly because it was warmer, and there are a million trails out here. In Alaska, without a plane or a serious off-road type vehicle, the trails are miserably few.

Back to Barlow to warm up by the fire.

The next morning, we decided to switch our campsite at Barlow Crossing to the sweet spot by the river. Just to change things up. I loved this spot.

Lookout Mountain Hike

And then we did the Lookout Mountain trail, even though we realized the weather was probably going to make the view not as spectacular as a clear day. It was fantastic.

Cool rock formation made by a hiker.

On the way up, you could already see the desert-like valley on the east side of Oregon through the lush forest. Such a delightful contrast.

You could literally see hundreds of miles around in every direction. Stunning. Not translating through pics :(

This ridge caused a panic attack for me. I'm terrified of heights, and when I'm on a ridge like this looking out over hundreds of miles of unspoiled wilderness, I feel like the wind is going to pick me up and toss me off the mountain. When I turned around in the same spot, which had a forest and not a ridge, I was completely fine. The brain is a funny thing - you can no better talk yourself down from fear-of-heights as you can talk yourself out of dizziness. The body takes control.

And back to our new site with a fire. I'm so glad we got to have fires AND isolation on this trip.

Umbrella Falls trail

The next day, we took the Umbrella Falls trail. So wonderful. It's right where a bunch of ski lodges are, so the trails crossed under the ski lift and slopes below. It's still a while away from the ski season, so it's eerily quiet, and the lifts are stationary with wrapped seats. Kinda ghost-towny. We actually saw some hunters on the trail with cross bows and a freshly gutted deer. I'll never forget that smell. It was awe-inspiring to see men hunt animals in the forest with a bow and arrow - we've never encountered that before. Pretty neat.

What a ski slope looks like in the off-season.

On a side note, the weather predictions here are a mess. Never did we have a correct forecast. On this day, sunny skies were predicted. So when I saw (and heard) this monster thunderstorm in the distance I was all "That's not hitting us!"

30 minutes later, it was clear that it was barreling toward us. We decided to head back before we got to the falls, even though we knew we weren't making it back down before we were slammed (luckily, we ALWAYS bring our rain gear). We were walking so fast at one point that Aaron tripped on a tree root and it was quite a spectacular fall. I watched the whole thing happen from behind - he got his foot hooked on it, and I swear it looked like a giant wind sucked him up into the air, turned him horizontally, and smashed him to the ground with a force so great I felt the earth move. Like Aaron was a dead weight. When I saw the impact, I was sure he broke his arm, nose and possibly his leg. My mind was already trying to figure out how to get him down off this mountain in the pouring rain. When he got up, face full of dirt, he was perfectly fine. A couple of small scratches to his nose, but otherwise unscathed. WHEW! What a scare!

And then it hit. Not a rain storm, a HAIL STORM! We were so excited! We've never been in a forest during a hail storm! Especially a tropical-looking rainforest that looks like it would NEVER see ice. We had to stop several times just to listen what it sounded like to hear hail hit the over-size ferns and plants. I will never forget that sound. SO THRILLING.

Then back to the fire after such an exciting day.

Even this picture doesn't due justice to how big the trees lying around here are. Way thicker than me.

Excellent tree roots.

McNeil Point 2015

This was our big hike, and our most terrifying experience. We saved this hike for last because we knew how much we loved it on our 2012 trip. One day backcountry and a 1200-foot challenging hike. In 2012, the weather was perfect. Totally clear and very warm. This year, at the same time as in 2012, it was cold and the clouds were so low that it looked (and felt) like a cloud storm. It wasn't raining, but we are so far up the mountain that the clouds bash into trees and the trees drip with the moisture. McNeil Point is one of two hikes that goes WAYYYY up Mt. Hood. The other hike, Cooper's Spur, requires rock climbing. Something you will never, EVER see us do. We're over 6000 feet up.

First, a series of exhausting switchbacks through the forest. Click the picture to see what this looked like on our 2012 hike.

It was very creepy. And this scary picture of me turned out to be prophetic. We had no idea what was in store for us on this hike.

After the forest climb, we finally reach the ridge. What we (didn't) see there was haunting.

It was getting colder and colder and more exposed as we ascended.

You can tell by the look on his face after traversing that rock field, Aaron was getting nervous. And he never gets nervous.

We found our spot! We camped here in 2012 and just LOVED it. But it was so cold I couldn't believe it wasn't snowing. When it's dripping wet out, the cold sinks way into your bones. It was like Alaska. You just couldn't keep warm or dry. Click on the picture to see how different the mood was in this very spot, at this very time of year in 2012. Oddly enough, the 2 glaciers that were on the mountain behind us were gone. Hard to imagine that when it was SOOOO cold now, and soooo warm back then. Also, even though it was dripping wet and we could have used a campfire, they were banned. We'd have a tough time making one anyway with no dry tinder.

Setting up the tent was really difficult. Both of us had completely frozen fingers and couldn't get a good grasp on the rivets and zippers. Ugh. I get exhausted even thinking about it. Once we set it up, we sat in there to warm up. Worked for a while, until we exited.

The area behind our camp. Click to see the 2012 version - can't believe those glaciers are gone. Seems impossible in this cold.

Those clouds whipped around at such a furious rate that I saw one crash into a tree and send dozens of birds flying out. Doesn't look like it, but this is one hell of a harsh climate all the way up here. Exposed.

We made the alcohol stove work enough by shielding the flame with rocks and our hands. I was shivering uncontrollably until I got some hot food in me.

And then to put up the food bag away from critters. This time I wasn't scared of bears. I was scared of freezing to death.

Our boots were cold and wet. Ugh. Reminders of Alaskan days.

Honestly, there was nothing (sane) that we could do. To be out in the wet and cold had us shivering dangerously. We got in the tent at 3:30, and stayed there until the morning. I was wearing multiple layers, a down coat with hood and a raincoat inside a good-below-freezing sleeping bag and was still shivering. The sound of the winds yelling outside our tent was one of the scariest things I've ever heard. You hear it coming from far away. Can't describe it. We laid there cuddled up with nothing to do but think to ourselves. Every 10 minutes or so I would say "Are you OK buddy?" and he would answer "Yeah - are you?". It was so strange (and kinda cool) to sit there in silent individual meditation for hours. Your brain moves so much slower, and all we could think about were the sounds around us. Very scary. At about 6:00 we had our panic moment. Aaron says "OK, it's 6:00, and the sun doesn't set until about 8:00. If we go down now, we might make it down before sunset." My gut told me that the best thing to do is to stay warm in the tent. If we packed all our wet things up and headed down that tricky trail in the dark, we could be in serious danger. The thing that sacred me the most was falling asleep and then waking up in 5 feet of snow with no trail. But even if that happened, we decided the best thing to do is to stay put until morning. Glad we did. I know we weren't going to find our way down without light. And probably not a good idea to be walking around in wet boots either. I think this was the scariest night in our camping history.

McNeil Point - the morning after

We woke up to this - a beautiful sunrise. Still cold, but no wet. And this moment lasted less than 30 minutes before it got cloudy again. After that harrowing night, you can imagine how grand this looked to us.

Clouds so thick on the top of Hood they cast a shadow.

A rainbow - can you believe it? Nature's reward to us for doing the right thing. Love the 3 cloud formations on top.

On the way down...

These trees are so protected with the lichen "Witches Hair" that it looks like a green cotton candy machine exploded all over the forest.

I love this dedication at the base of the trailhead. I love this beautiful mountain too.

After all of that, and now that it was raining pretty hard (HA! Would you believe the day we picked was the better of the 2 days we were planning doing this hike?) we said "Screw camping tonight!" and we went to the small town of Government Camp. It's a delightfully unpretentious ski town with a sleepy off-season mood. We got a room at the Huckleberry Inn for just over a hundred bucks. We felt euphoric, and had such a terrific time being warm and sleeping on a mattress and not caring if we spill a few crumbs on our clothes (you don't want any smells on you when you're camping - attracts bears) I think Aaron may have actually rubbed a muffin on his shirt in defiance.

Heh heh.

Our awesome room! What a contrast from the night before...

Timberline Lodge

The next day was our last day, and we headed back to Portland. Before we left, we took a trip to the Timberline Lodge. You may recognize it from the opening shots in the movie "The Shining" - the aerial shot of the hotel. The sequence that shows Jack Nicholson's character driving up the mountains to the hotel is actually filmed in Glacier Park (Montana), but the hotel itself is on Mt. Hood. I didn't even realize that the opening shot doesn't include the maze garden (which is a studio set, not a real maze). The hotel is wonderfully charming and we're so glad we visited. If any of you want to go to this area, I highly recommend staying here. Though, just like in the movie, it is pretty secluded and out-of-the-way.

There was a different animal carving on every staircase landing.

You can see how far up the ski lift goes up the mountain, and they have scenic rides. Not for me - are you kidding? I'd die of fear.

You could see all the way to Mt. Jefferson (about 50 miles away) when the clouds allowed.

Back to Portland, and a quick visit with Aaron and Duncan before we go back home... Their home is just as adorable as their dog.

He took us to throw sticks in the river with Duncan. Such an awesome beach right in the city. I don't think Duncan knows he is missing a leg. He's as strong and fast as any 4-legged dog.

And now we're home! Already planning our next summer adventure. Likely in the desert after all this rain.