Eagle Creek: First bike + backpack of the season!

Memorial Day! This is frequently a weird holiday for me since though I often have some time off, I also often have a hard time getting psyched on it. I’m not sure why really — maybe cuz the snowpack is still usually kinda low, the camping weather is sometimes iffy, I usually don’t have sooo many days off that I feel like I can do a big thing, though that’s all mostly excuses in my head I think. But point being, I knew for months that I had four days off, but decided maybe two days before what I would do with them: go backpacking at Eagle Creek.

I also wanted to volunteer at the Hollywood Farmer’s Market, though — since I mostly work Saturdays, I don’t get to do that as much as I’d like, but it’s one of those soul-filling things for me:) So, since I had Saturday off, I built in time for that too, to hang out amidst the strawberries and asparagus:)

All told, here’s how the weekend shook out:

.

.

Saturday: I volunteered at the market in the morning, then made a market-veggie lunch and packed up all leisure-style at home. I biked the 36ish miles out to Ainsworth State Park (where there is a hiker/biker campsite) in the late afternoon, getting there early evening. The Historic Highway was a bit of a zoo, being a holiday weekend and a beautiful Saturday, but I left late enough that it wasn’t quite peak traffic — and anyway, people were super courteous and I had a lovely ride.

.

(everything was in flower too!)

.

Sunday: up early to bike the last 8 miles or so to the Eagle Creek trailhead. There is a campground at Eagle Creek too, but it doesn’t have a hiker/biker site and I definitely did not trust that there would be space available if I rolled in late on a Saturday of a three-day weekend. When I got to the trailhead, I transferred my stuff to my backpack, locked up my bike, and hiked the Eagle Creek trail. It was super busy on a beautiful Memorial Day Sunday, but not so much after Tunnel Falls. I camped about 9 miles in in a site all to myself.

.

(I almost never leave my bike locked conspicuously like this, liking instead to stash it in the woods and lock it to a tree where no one will notice it, but it felt highly trafficked in a good way here and I felt fine about just leaving my bike in the open for two nights. Ha, I also had the realization, like 7 miles up the trail, that I maybe hadn’t actually locked the frame to the post, which if you look at the picture is mostly true, but it was still fine)

.

Monday: from the same camp, I day hiked to to Wahtum Lake, which was still pretty snowy, and past there up to Chinidere Mountain, which was not so snowy. There was a bit of routefinding over snow, near and beyond Wahtum Lake, but on the whole it was pretty chill. I did, however, opt not to go to Tomlike Mountain like I thought I might because I got tired of snow-hiking. I still ended up hiking around 12 miles.

.

(I haven’t been to Eagle Creek since way before it burned in 2017, and it was pretty cool to see things growing back)

.

(a little snowy near Wahtum Lake still;)

.

(from the top of Chinidere Mountain you can really see the extent of the Eagle Creek fire — plus Mount St. Helens (on the right) and Rainier, Adams, Hood, and Jefferson not in the frame)

.

Tuesday: I was up at 4:50am because of a very insistent bird and heck, it’s light then anyway. So I had a very early and super lovely hike back out the 9ish miles, transferred everything back to my bike, and bike the 44ish miles home, stopping at a few Historic Highway spots on the way.

.

(this is my favorite waterfall in the whole world right now, just a bit uptrail from Tunnel Falls. I call it Twisty Falls, though it probably has an actual name;)

.

So, this ended up being everything I’d hoped for and more. Not only did I get to start the weekend off with a whole bunch of happy people and fresh produce and the farmers I love, but I got in a bit of bike camping, plus the backcountry time that I’d really, really been missing without realizing it. I came home soooo happy, and like I’d just been away for weeks even though it had only been basically three days. And I love so much that this is possible, even with a two-day lead time and starting to pack like two hours before I left, right from my house in Portland. YAY!!