It was refreshing to finally have a snowshoeing day out! Here are a few favorites from the loop around Salt Creek and Diamond Falls. Hope you’re out enjoying your weekend!
We hike… a lot, but now we have crossed over into the world of backpacking. I have to say, I’m hooked! We chose a couple alpine lakes to test out our gear before heading to Arizona next month. I spent hours in REI, our local outdoor shop and online. It was time well spent, I’m very happy with my choices!
Henline Mountain trail is an in and out hike with a distance of 7.8 miles to reach the top and back. The high point is 4650ft up with a 2955ft elevation gain through switchbacks. Once at the top, the view of Mount Jefferson is spectacular. A link to a full description of the trail is available here.
One of our favorite weekend adventures includes packing the truck up and simply driving until we come across the perfect campsite. This weekend we explored the Breitenbush wilderness.
Mt. Bachelor is known for its ski resort. We decided to venture away from the crowds and in my opinion ended up with the better views. There are multiple snow parks surrounding the ski resort with areas to snow shoe as well as snow mobile. We chose a butte just south of the mountain.
This was my first adventure with snow shoes and I have to say… I have been missing out! You have the ability to climb just about anything you want in the snow. This will be the first of many snow adventures.
Sneak peek from our winter wonderland holiday card adventure!
The North Umqua Trail system and National Forest follow the Umqua River east of Roseburg up to Diamond Lake. There is a great website that breaks up the trail into sections for mountain biking, horseback riding, hiking, etc. We chose to focus on a couple of waterfalls and a natural hot spring.
The deer leap segment has Toketee Falls, 120 feet in total, a double tiered waterfall 80 and 40 feet over a sheer wall of columnar basalt and into an emerald pool of water below. Toketee is Chinook for “graceful”. I have to say, this is one of my favorites of Oregon so far. We were contemplating on hiking to the pool, but there is a steep segment guided by a very thin rope that did not in any way look reliable, so we skipped that view. Next time I’ll be prepared with my own rope.
The Umqua hot springs hug the river and steep cliffside. It’s about a 0.3 mile walk from the parking lot or a 3.5 mile hike from Toketee Lake.
Last, but not least, on this trip we decided to take in Watson Falls as well. It’s similar to Salt Creek by their basalt amphitheaters, but Watson is the 3rd tallest waterfall in Oregon at 272 or 292 feet, depending on your source.
A cascading beauty, Salt Creek Falls, is Oregon’s second largest waterfall at 286 feet, formed during the last ice age. The waterfall gets its name from its parent stream, Salt Creek. There are a series of springs downstream with high salt content, giving root to the name.
Getting there: Oregon route 58, east of Eugene and Oakridge. There is a $5 day use fee unless you have a US Forest Pass.
Trails: There is a 3 mile loop and a 6 mile semi-loop to choose from. Due to weather, we only did parts of the trail, making our way up to Too Much Bear Lake and Diamond Creek Falls. The view from the bottom of Salt Creek Falls is pretty phenomenal, climbing down the shale cliffside is equally exciting and not recommended for those that easily bruise.