Since I’m going to be having cataract surgery this week (which means I will be down for a week or two) and because I didn’t get out last weekend, I wanted to make sure I got out this weekend. My
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Four Stars
11/6/2024 – Baty Butte Trail
Today’s hike was to take advantage of some gorgeous November weather and to burn a vacation day. Zack and I had been thinking about heading up to Baty Butte the weekend before but it looked AWFULLY wet so we decided
… Read the rest 10/19/2024 – Thunder Mountain/Skookum Lake – 542/543
Today’s hike is a milestone – if I’ve done my statistics correctly, today’s hike is my 500th hike/trip! That is pretty crazy! Wonder how long it will take me to get to 1000? It took me 22 years to get
… Read the rest 8/24/2024 – Cottonwood Meadows – 705
Today’s hike turned out considerably differently than expected. The plan was to hike the Cottonwood Meadows trail from the southern trailhead – go up the trail to the northern trailhead and turn around and come back down. We encountered a
… Read the rest 8/15/2024 – Rho Creek – 569
Today’s hike had one simple purpose – to enjoy a beautiful old trail. Little did I realize that it had been COMPLETELY cut out end to end, which only made the day that much better! I haven’t taken much vacation
… Read the rest 7/20/2024 – Fish Creek Mountain – 541
Today’s hike was intended to complete the recon of the Fish Creek Mountain trail post fire. Kirk and I had attempted to complete this trip a few weeks ago but ran out of time. Since the gate at the 4620
… Read the rest 6/22/2024 – Fish Creek Mountain – Side Door
After hearing that there was a way to get up to the Fish Creek Mountain trail relatively easily, I’ve wanted to explore this trail after the fire. Today was the day. We headed out a bit early since I needed
… Read the rest 5/11/2024 – Bissell/Old Baldy 502
The weather today was supposed to be sunny and unseasonably hot. I wanted to get up into snow somewhere, and decided to either do the White Iris trail or the Bissell trail, depending on which we could get to. It
… Read the rest 4/27/2024 – Rho Creek – 569
The plan for today’s hike was to see how far we could get up the Rho Creek trail. The modeled snow depth maps showed no snow at the trailhead and then about halfway up the trail, the snow quickly getting
… Read the rest 4/13/2024 – Fanton Trail
Today’s hike was intended to be a snowshoe trip. The plan was to take the Fanton trail (a favorite snowshoe destination of mine) as far as we could. Kirk had to get back for a family event, so it was
… Read the rest 12/16/2023- Rho Ridge North – 564 – SNOW!
Today’s hike was a spur of the minute hike. I had originally intended to stay home and work on a Christmas present for our granddaughters. The weather was supposed to be beautiful and some recent snow had mostly melted. I
… Read the rest 12/9/2023 – Burnt Granite – SNOW! – 595
We’ve had some cold weather and a bunch of rain, so higher elevations have gotten more snow. Looking at the modeled snow maps, I was hoping we might be able to get up to a last of the season higher
… Read the rest 11/24/2023 – Burnt Granite
The weather forecast was for beautiful sunny weather. I keep thinking that the high country is gone – we’ve had a few snow storms which seemed like they would stick, but the snow melted, and higher elevations have still been
… Read the rest 10/21/2023 – Rho Ridge North End – 564
This trip was just a “get out in the woods” kind of a trip. We were dog sitting the “grand dog” for the weekend, so he joined Thor and I on this trip. I had several ideas on where to
… Read the rest 10/9/2023 – Horseshoe Saddle and Ruddy Hill
Sorry for the small map above – I wanted to make sure I captured the waypoint of the tread I recalled being shown years ago – more on that later…
… Read the rest Today’s trip was planned to be a pretty quick trip
9/10-9/14/2023 – Necklace Valley Backpack
This trip was my annual backpacking trip with Carly – number 20! These are all the backpacking trips we’ve taken:
… Read the rest - 2002-Duffy Lake – Mt Jefferson Wilderness
- 2004-Red Lake
- 2005-Shining Lake
- 2006-Big Slide Lake – Bull of the Woods Wilderness
- 2007-Doris
9/4/2023 – Schreiner Peak
Today’s hike is one I’ve wanted to do for a long time. Kirk suggested we do it on Labor Day. I will be doing my annual backpack trip with Carly next weekend and needed to do some conditioning anyway, so
… Read the rest 8/26/2023 – Rho Creek Trail – 569
Today’s hike was one where I wanted to hike a trail I hadn’t hiked in a while. I was thinking about doing the north end of Rho Ridge but it was forecast to be kind of warm and I thought
… Read the rest 8/18/2023 – Thunder Mountain and Skookum Lake
Today’s hike was a “take Friday off” hike – I planned a short day since we normally babysit the grandkids on Friday. Thor and I headed out early so we could get back early and I decided to do the
… Read the rest 8/2/2023 – God’s Thumb
Today’s trip was a totally unplanned, last minute trip. We were on our family vacation in Lincoln City and we were kind of in-between “things”. Abby stayed at a house in Lincoln City a month or so ago and had
… Read the rest 7/22/2023 – Memaloose Lake and South Fork Mtn Trails – 515
Today’s hike was originally going to be a work day on another trail, but that fell thru. I decided to do an easier hike today after the last few hikes. On the last hike I had kind of wanted to
… Read the rest 3/4/2023 – Half Creek Waterfall Explorations
Today’s hike was spurred by some info I got from a friend last week at a meeting of the Trail Advocates. A new waterfall had been found after the fires opened things up. It was a pretty tall waterfall and
… Read the rest 2/11/2023 – Bagby Trail Explorations
Today’s hike was different than many I’ve done recently. The weather on Saturday was forecast to be really nice, which turned out to be very accurate. I wanted to get out, and after some discussion with Kirk, we decided to
… Read the rest 1/28/2023 – Fanton Snowshoe
Today’s hike was a relatively simple plan – one which I’ve done before. The idea is to drive up the 4614 road as far as you can to catch the Fanton trail, and then hike it up as far as
… Read the rest 1/1/2023 – Fish Creek – Post Fire
Today’s hike was my annual New Years Day hike – I’ve done it 10 of the last 12 years. Since you can now legally enter burned areas on foot, we decided to head up the old Fish Creek road (road
… Read the rest 12/17/2022 – Hillockburn Trail and Road 45
Note: The beginning of the track in the map above is a little messed up because I forgot to turn off the battery saver on my phone.
… Read the rest Today’s hike was intended to explore the damage done to the Hillockburn trail
10/29/2022 – Burnt Granite Trail
Today’s hike was to take advantage of what I thought would be a relatively nice day for late October. Since we haven’t had easy access to trails down south in the Clackamas (due to all the closures), I wanted to
… Read the rest 10/22/2022 – Hawk Mountain
Today’s hike was planned to be a contingent hike. A cold front had moved in and it was supposed to rain (maybe a lot) – I didn’t really feel like hiking in heavy rain, so I figured I’d just see
… Read the rest 9/24/2022 – Bull of the Woods
Today’s hike had two objectives:
… Read the rest - To hike to the Bull of the Woods and look at the remains of the lookout that was destroyed in the fires last year (and also see the burned areas)
- To explore north of the
9/6-9/9/2022 – Alpine Lakes Wilderness Backpack Loop
This trip was my annual backpacking trip with Carly (Number 18). Originally, we were planning to climb Luna Peak a little farther north. A few days before we were to leave, a fire broke out near where we would be
… Read the rest 9/3/2022 – Corral Springs Trail
Today’s hike had two objectives:
… Read the rest - To do some conditioning before my annual backpacking trip with Carly
- To see if I could find any evidence of a continuation of Corral Springs on the south side of Roaring River
We headed out
8/13/2022 – Baty Butte to Powerlines
Today’s trip was kind of a surprise (the destination was) – for the last 2 years, the majority of the Clackamas has been closed due to fires. Even though a huge portion of the district didn’t burn, the roads getting
… Read the rest 6/28/2022 – Sahalie Falls Loop
This hike was an “all hands” hike that was family friendly. We did it on our family vacation near Sisters. The plan was to view Koosah falls and then take the river trail to Sahalie Falls and back. It is
… Read the rest 6/27/2022 – South Sister Summit in Snow
Today’s hike was Carly’s request. We had a family vacation in Sisters and since she didn’t get to climb South Sister in 2019 when did the Three Sisters backpack loop, she wanted to do it during this trip. Nicholas wanted
… Read the rest 6/20/2022 – Fanton and Old Baldy Trails
Today’s hike was intended to be kind of a redemption from all the rain we’ve had recently. It was Juneteenth and I had the day off and the weather report looked good – mostly sunny weather. When I woke up
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