Silver Falls State Park

(Note:  Two requests for identification are at the end of the post, one flower and one bird, so ID gurus–you know who you are– may want to skip to the end to check them out and give me your best guesses.)

People call Silver Falls the “crown jewel” of the Oregon State Parks system, at least according to its website, and you couldn’t disprove it by me.  I just got back from a couple of most excellent days/nights there and took lots of pictures, so this is a long post.

The first day, my brother and his wife took a day trip down from Portland and we got to discover things together.  First, a couple of pictures of my first view of the South Falls (there will be more later.  You have been warned.)

And of my brother and his wife with the falls in the background.  I couldn’t decide where to put the falls relative to them, and I like both pics, so am including both.

We did a bit of exploring of the area around the South Falls facilities, which is now officially designated some kind of Historic Area, and then took the short drive up to the the North Falls viewpoint.  I’m including both pics I took there simply because I’m struck by the difference in color quality of the two pictures, taken with the same “camera” (my iphone) at the same time of day from the same spot–the only difference is the first is zoomed in a bit.  Pictures lie, even un-edited pictures.  Of course, color is tricky.

          

They then dropped me off at my campsite and headed back to Portland, and I let the cats out and set up camp (not that there’s a lot of setup, but still.)

The cats have gotten weird about being out in a camp, Phantom more than Shadow.  Both want to be out at night, not surprising since cats are nocturnal by nature.  But up until a few months ago, both were eager to be out when I pulled into a campground during the day, too.  Not so much anymore.

Shadow is still fairly willing:

Phantom, on the other hand, tends to head back to van.

Shadow even took a short walk with me and CJ.

While Phantom waited, not happily back at camp (look to the left of the van–the little gray spot).  We heard him meowing several times; they have a particularly distressed-sounding meow they seem to use to call each other.

And speaking of brother-cats, this is cute,

but this is cuter.

The next day, after a very lazy start, I used the trike to go back up to the South Falls area to take the hike down and around behind it.  Saw these on my way out.  They didn’t spook at all (while I stopped, stared, pulled out the phone, got it on, and took the picture), which I think was partly because I was on the trike rather than in a car, but being in a state park they’re probably pretty tame regardless so who knows.

I took a bunch of pictures on the relatively short hike down under the falls and back up.  First, approaching the falls:

Behind the falls:

Emerging from behind the falls, you can see a trail to the left that continues for miles past several other falls.  I did not do that hike, but would like to some day.

50+ years ago, I remember hiking in to South Falls with my church youth group.  I’m not entirely sure where we started, though my memory wants to say somewhere near Stayton, but I know it was several miles–and the trail was in spots hard to see.  There were several creeks to cross, and we got very wet, and cold.  But it was worth it to walk behind the falls (and for the sense of accomplishment).  Back in the day, that nice strong fence you see was not there–when we were behind the falls, there was nothing between us and the drop-off, which was just scary enough to be stimulating and to remember all these years later.  I don’t think that bridge was there either–I think if you wanted to get up to the park facilities, you had to go behind the falls.

Anyway, back to pictures.

Here are a few showing the approach to the falls from that trail.  Here you’re just beginning to see the falls.

Closer. . .

And there it is.

This one is from the bridge, zoomed in a bit, showing the nice strong new-to-me (heh) fence behind the falls.

I’m tossing this one in just because I like it.

OK, enough of the falls for now.

Once I got back up to the top, I found the bike trail and rode up it a ways.  Possibly illegally, since it is clearly labeled “No motorized vehicles”, but no one was around so what the heck.  It was steep enough in spots I was doing  some pedal-assist, and a bit rough, but definitely doable.  Here’s proof the trike went up.

Back at the campground, I decided to try triking with CJ on a leash.

It worked better than I expected–we went around the campground three times, giving her a good run.  She has a tendency to want to run out in front, turn around, and bark at the trike, which is bad enough when she’s off-leash and dangerous when on, so I had to hold her back.  In fact, for awhile I didn’t need to propel the trike at all–CJ was pulling hard enough to keep us going.  Perhaps the husky in her :-).

But she’s learning.  This morning, back at home, we triked down to a field, left the trike and walked around the field, and triked back up, “down” and “up” being literally true in this hilly town.  She’s beginning to learn that her position is beside the trike, which is good news for both of us.

Wednesday morning, before leaving, I triked with CJ up a bike trail from the campground to the falls area and we walked around a bit.  Here’s the falls in the morning light.

Here’s a baby falls, just getting started in life.  The picture is very deceptive–it’s a long way down to the rivulet below, I’d guess 100 feet or more, but it looks like 15-20 feet or so.  That’s foreshortening and 2-D for you.

Caught this one while walking back to the trike.  You don’t see the falls, but the mist rising from it is lit up by the morning light.  I thought it made a nice farewell shot.

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Identifications requested section

First, a flower.  Perhaps a wild rose?  But I didn’t see any thorns, so perhaps not.

Second, a bird.  None of the shots are good, because they were taken through the van’s side window, so I’ve included the best three.  It reminded me of a Stellar’s jay, without the crest and a different color.  Anyone know what it is?

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