Wahkeena Falls

A few weekends ago, we took a break from skiing to explore a new trail in the Columbia River Gorge. After consulting my little hiking guidebook, "Curious Gorge", I decided on the five-mile Multnomah/Wahkeena Falls Loop. Multnomah Falls is for sure a tourists waterfall. You can find people here with coffee in-hand on ANY given day. This loop hike starts with a mile climb to the top of Multnomah Falls and then decends down past Wahkeena. Unfortunately, the Multnomah side of the trail was "CLOSED DUE TO ICE ON THE TRAIL". So, we decided to do an out and back hike on the Wahkeena side. It's always just nice to get out. :)

There were a few signs on the trail warning of trail damage. One of the main bridges was destroyed in the flooding we had right before winter. Yowza!


This definitely wasn't one of my favorite trails, since the first few miles is paved. Ick.

Once you get a few miles in, the trail is dirt and much more enjoyable. It was raining and foggy in spots. Neat.


On the way out, we stopped at a lookout point to see what we could see. Washington smiles on the other side of the Columbia River.

Down below a little pond is frozen in some funny patterns. There's a lot of noise on many of the gorge trails that sit close to highway 84 and the train tracks–and this is one of them. The tourists can have this one. Sorry Wahkeena. Now let's ski before it's summer!