Afoot and Afield: Portland/Vancouver. Douglas Lorain
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hikers out there, for the much anticipated second edition of Afoot & Afield Portland/Vancouver. Those familiar with the first edition will find several changes and significant improvements. First of all, every map has been redone, updated, and significantly improved to be more user friendly. Most trips now have their own map while others are shown on a map with other nearby trails, and many more landmarks and details are shown to help visitors follow the trail. In addition, the organizational format and numbering system has been streamlined to make it much easier for you to find hikes in the area you are interested in visiting.
Easily the most important feature of the second edition, however, is that it includes 60 brand-new adventures to spectacular destinations in every corner of our region, almost all of which come with the bonus of solitude being a virtual certainty. Every Portland/Vancouver area outdoor lover, no matter how many years they have been hiking local trails, is guaranteed to find numerous great hikes that they have never taken and probably didn’t even know existed. Among these new hikes are trips to a truly superb waterfall on remote North Siouxon Creek in Southwest Washington, several trails exploring the sunny and flower-covered slopes of the eastern Columbia River Gorge, a hike to a virtually unknown clifftop viewpoint in the Clackamas River country that will absolutely blow your (hiking) socks off, details on how to find a new trail up previously closed Fish Creek Mountain, paths leading to remote and beautiful fishing spots in the almost unknown canyons of Roaring River and South fork Clackamas River, descriptions of little-traveled routes in usually crowded areas like Silver Falls and Oxbow parks, several newly constructed trails in the Coast Range’s Clatsop State Forest, and literally dozens more. In addition, every hike from the first edition of the book has been updated, and 10 of them have undergone major revisions due to trailheads being relocated and/or the trails themselves being completely rerouted.
With all these additions, the book now describes nearly 200 hikes within an hour’s drive of the city, so it is safe to say that nothing has been excluded. The goal was to include absolutely every local “wild” trail, making this book the comprehensive “bible” for all nearby hikes. You no longer have to own several different books or check several different sources to find a suitable trail or a description of a particular route you want to hike. If you can’t find it here, it either doesn’t exist or isn’t legally accessible. So, get out those hiking boots and hit the trails, my fellow pedestrians. You are fortunate enough to live in a city with almost unlimited options for enjoying your favorite activity in beautiful surroundings. And you now own a guide that details every one of those options. The outdoors is yours to explore and savor. See you on the trails!
Introducing the Portland/Vancouver Area
In most cities, a book like this would begin with something like “welcome to the wildlands beyond the city’s familiar concrete jungle.” But no Portland/Vancouver resident would recognize or agree with that characterization because this is a city still firmly tied to Mother Nature. One reason for this, of course, is that often Ma Nature literally hits you in the face with rain as soon as you walk out the door—a humbling and a useful reminder of just who’s in charge here. But even when it isn’t raining, the natural world is still constantly in evidence. It’s just a short drive from anywhere in the greater Portland area to forests so wild that you are more likely to see elk than other people. On the city’s skyline sits not only Mt. Hood, the signature landmark of our region, but four other wild volcanic peaks: Mounts Adams, Jefferson, Rainier, and St. Helens. Parts of the Columbia River Gorge, only 30 minutes from the downtown skyscrapers, remain as wild today as when Meriwether Lewis and William Clark passed through the region in 1805.
But Portland is not only surrounded by wild country, it manages to include wilderness right in the city limits. The enormity of Forest Park, the largest forested city park in the world, provides country that is wilder than many designated wilderness areas. In the towering evergreens that stand in virtually every city neighborhood live gray squirrels, raccoons, great horned owls, and other wildlife. Endangered peregrine falcons live amid the downtown buildings and bridges. People even fish for salmon in the Willamette River in downtown Portland. So Portland is truly a city where you can never really escape the natural world—and that’s just the way we like it.
Every Imaginable Shade of Green: The Local Flora
I once had a friend who moved from the Pacific Northwest to Phoenix, Arizona. He liked his new environment but would constantly comment about how much he missed the color green. All the rain the Portland area gets ensures that even in the dry months of late summer it always stays green. Washington may officially be the Evergreen State, but it’s Portland that takes the honor as the evergreen city.
All that greenery is composed of thousands of plant species inhabiting dozens of different environments. Professional botanists recognize a wide range of plant communities throughout our area. The average hiker, however, won’t notice most of these because the same species are predominant throughout the region. Once you learn to recognize these relatively few species, you are well on your way to feeling like an expert and getting more enjoyment from your travels.
Bunchberry blossoms
As all of us umbrella-toting Portlanders already know, we live in a virtual rain forest. That forest is made up of a canopy of big trees with several layers of understory species.
Douglas fir is by far the most abundant species on the forest’s top floor. Point at any random conifer on most of the trails in this book and there is roughly a 75 percent chance that the tree is a Douglas fir. At lower elevations the second most common species is the western hemlock, a beautiful evergreen with tiny needles and drooping limbs. At the highest elevations of the Cascade Mountains, the hemlock family banner is taken up by a close relative, the mountain hemlock. A similar thing happens with cedars. At lower elevations look for western red cedar, while in the high country Alaska yellow cedar takes over. With the true firs you should recognize grand fir down low, Pacific silver fir and noble fir at mid-elevations, and subalpine fir up high. Other evergreen species of note include Engelmann spruce, western white pine, and lodgepole pine.
Deciduous trees are less common than conifers, but they mix with the evergreens at all lower elevations, and in some areas leafy trees actually outnumber those with needles. Especially abundant are bigleaf maple and red alder. On the drier hills you will find woodlands of Oregon white oak, while in the wet bottomlands of the river valleys there are black cottonwoods. From mid-October to mid-November both bigleaf maple and black cottonwood grace the area with their bright yellow leaves.
Get off the elevator at the second floor of our forests, and the doors will open up to a whole array of smaller tree species. Most notable of these is the vine maple, another great fall-color species. This short understory tree has many-pointed leaves that turn a striking reddish-orange color in October. Another second-story species is the Pacific yew, a fascinating conifer that lives in shady forests and uses red berrylike fruits, instead of cones, to reproduce. Pacific dogwood, with its showy white blossoms in April and May, also deserves mention. Other common small trees on the second story include Pacific willow, Sitka alder, black hawthorn, and Oregon ash.
Below these small trees is a layer of large and small shrubs. Once again, unless you want to be an expert, you need only to learn a handful of the most common species. Many of the larger shrubs are berries, like salmonberry, thimbleberry, and blackberry, all of which have tasty edible fruit in season. Other common large shrubs include elderberry (both red and blue varieties), serviceberry, snowberry, and devil’s club. Probably the most abundant large shrub at mid-elevations in the Cascades is the Pacific rhododendron. From May to early July, the showy pink blossoms of this evergreen plant put on displays that can even make clear-cuts look good—well, almost.
Moving down to the forest’s ground floor takes us to the low-growing shrubs. The most important member of this group, especially for your taste buds, is the huckleberry. From mid-August until mid-September the positively delicious berries of this abundant mid- to high-elevation plant will slow the berry-picking hiker’s progress to