On Sunday July 29th, 2012 Laina and I headed
to the Silver Falls State Park, it is located just east of Salem OR about 25
minutes. This park is magnificent, it
has 10 waterfalls all on one walking trail with a complete loop about 8.7 miles. In our case we missed a trail and back
tracked so we ended up walking 9.5 miles but every step of the journey was
worth the hike. We started the journey
at South Falls, it is a 177 ft falls and very beautiful.
As we head up the trail towards the rest of the falls we
were hiking next to this creek that goes from one end of the part to the
other. As you can see there was a vast
variety of trees, undergrowth and foliage giving us lots to looks at and
admire.
As we continue down the path we continue deeper into the
gorge, which was like a bowl effect, we were walking along and had to go down a complete set of stairs.
At the bottom of the stairs we round the corner and we
see Lower South Falls that is a 93 ft waterfall.
As we walk behind the falls the power and beauty of the
falls made us stop and admire the in awe of the power. This is a picture of the water hitting the
rocks below.
This next picture is a view of the trail we had just
walked down looking back through the water.
As we continue up the trail we come
upon a canopy type covering the trail, I
tried to capture this in the following picture but I think you may need to use
your imagination.
Lower North Falls about a 30 ft fall is next on our
trip.
Back out on the main trail we come up on Drake Falls 27
ft drop
Even farther up
the trail we spot in the distance Middle North Falls with a drop of 106
ft. I could not get a better close up
shot but you can still see how beautiful it is
But luckily I had taken the picture
before we got to marker on the path.
About 4 miles into our hike the clouds finally started
to part and the blue sky started to show itself…if you know anything about the
NW we have a lot of cloudy days even in the summer.
Obviously this part of the trail is a little less
travelled because it had a lot of foliage on the edges of the trail.
As we get closer the falls gets larger and more
magnificent. I am in awe at the beauty
and shear power of the water hitting the rocks below.
Similar to the other side the trail winds its way behind the water fall in a cave like area that has been cut away by the power of the water. The rocks have so many different colors.
At the top of the path we continue up past the parking
lot and long a path that leads to last waterfall, but on our way we see Oregon
Grapes and Berries of different sizes and colors.
Not far past the bride we find the last falls on our
route, Upper North Falls with a 65 ft drop.
The last part of the hike is approx. a 3 mile hike
through the woods along the road and bike path.
At one point on the trial we come upon 2 men trying to see this little creature
and to take pictures of him. None of us
knew what this is but it looks like a large hamster of some sorts or a baby Nutria. In any case it would scurry into its whole
then come back up to the trail edge and eat, then back to its hole. This went on for quite some time until these
girls came up with their dog then he took off and didn’t come back. He was really a cute little guy.
As we get to a parking lot close to the park where we
had parked we realize that there was one more fall that had missed, Winter
Falls it has a 134 ft drop.
We then have to figure out which is the best way back to
the car to continue down this trail or to back track from where we had just
come from so we asked a couple of volunteers – they were shocked that we had
walked all the way around the whole park…. I am not sure why they were so
surprised we knew we could do it!!!
Thank you for going on this journey with me and I look forward to taking
you on the next hike with me.