Ramona Falls is pretty special as far as waterfalls ago, not only for its beauty but for the fact that it’s protected inside the Mount Hood Wilderness. Ramona Creek tumbles down about 120 feet across broken basalt before flowing into the nearby Sandy River. The falls were first discovered in 1845 when Sam Barlow and his team of pioneers had to abandon construction of a wagon route around Mt. Hood before the onset of winter.
Kim and I decided to head north for the weekend (well at least for about 24 hours or so). We set up camp a few feet off the road near Washington’s Lower Lewis River Falls. From there we did a small bit of hiking and then headed up to an overlook to watch the sunset behind Mt. St. Helens. Not a bad way to spend a summer weekend in the Pacific Northwest!
Deep in Oregon’s southeast corner sits an immense tract of jagged rock formations, sagebrush steppe and strikingly colored desert known as the Owyhee Canyonlands. This is Oregon’s “Grand Canyon” – one of the largest unprotected roadless areas in the continental United States. And it contains hundreds of miles of wild and scenic rivers and a geological beauty that rivals desert lands that many Oregonian’s believe only exist in southern Utah. Here are some shots from a trip I recently made to Leslie Gulch in late June.
Some people have a strange idea of fun. For me it’s all about staying up for over 24 hours to spend the night on a Mountain watching and photographing the stars. The clear skies and new moon last night called for a bit of a star party! Here’s the night sky over Mount Hood and Trillium Lake. (Click on the image to see a larger version).
McIntyre Ridge in Oregon’s Mount Hood National Forest is a pretty grueling hike straight up the side of the mountain, but the rewards are well worth the effort.
I spent the day with some amazing photographers taking images that will be used to protect Oregon’s Tillamook and Clatsop State Forests. These two state forests cover over 800 square miles of beautiful coastal rain forest just west of the Portland metro area. They contain watersheds that are critical to Salmon recovery in the northwest and that serve as the drinking water supply for hundreds of thousands of Oregonians. Today, these forests are threatened by efforts to increase the level of industrial clear-cutting in sensitive areas.
Elowah falls is a hidden gem tucked between large lichen-covered cliffs in Oregon’s Columbia River Gorge. Here, McCord creek crashes out of the forest and plummets 289 feet into a large amphitheater and the deep pool below. The falls are at their best in the late winter and spring, though (like just about everything in Oregon) they are beautiful year round! It took some effort to work my way over the rocks and downstream to get this shot, but seeing the falls from this perspective was well worth the effort!
The water on Eel Lake was as smooth as glass as the sun rose behind it earlier this month at William Tugman State Park near Coos Bay, Oregon.
Oregon has just about everything—including the largest expanse of coastal sand dunes in North America. These wind-sculpted sand tunes tower over 500 feet above sea level and make for a challenging hike across the desert-like sand.
