3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

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mileagemike25000
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3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by mileagemike25000 » March 14th, 2013, 8:06 pm

Saturday was quite a beautiful day for a hike. Thanks to Roy for the great recommendation of trying out the Columbia River Dike Hike. :) I'm still taking it slowly with the knee rehabilitation, and it's going fairly well! We were going to start at the Steigerwald Lake parking lot off of SR14, but it was closed. :? So we started the hike in the parking area next to Capt. William Clark Park.
1 Columbia River Dike Hike_(1).JPG
We walked up the dike and headed over toward Cottonwood Beach. Just past the Dike is a better sign for the park!
2 Head out toward Cottonwood Beach_(1).JPG
We reached the beach and found quite a few old canoes.
3 Old canoes at  beachfront_(1).JPG
We didn't walk along the beach, but had some great views of the Columbia River!
4 Nice view of beach and Columbia River_(1).JPG
Continuing on the path that paralleled the beach, we soon looped around and back onto the dike. Heading east we soon intersected the border for the Steigerwald Wildlife Refuge. :)
5 Steigerwald Lake  boundary_(1).JPG
Walking on the dike was excellent for a rehab hike, and the views were quite pleasing. :D
6 View from the dike_(1).JPG
And we came to a bench with an awesome view, and stopped to rest the knee a while!
7 Bench with a great view of Refuge_(1).JPG
Continuing east, we reached the entrance to the Gibbons Creek Wildlife Art Trail. Note that the trail doesn't go all the way through the refuge as part of it is closed due to last year's fire! :( We turned left onto the trail.
8 Gibbons Creek Wildlife Art Trail_(1).JPG
Once on this trail, it was much less crowded than the dike trail! We came to a post that had info on the bird species and direction arrows for different migration locations.
9 Directions for the migrating birds_(1).JPG
This portion of the trail had a great view of a marsh/flood plain.
10 Marsh(1).JPG
Not far from the signpost was a lengthy bridge that allowed passage over the flooded areas!
11 Bridge across flood plain_(1).JPG
The views, in both directions, from this bridge were spectacular. :o :D
12 Spectacular View from bridge - Mt. Hood in background!_(1).JPG
13 Sun reflected in marsh!_(1).JPG
Again, we went a bit further than I wanted, so we turned around after crossing the bridge. Just over the bridge we met a couple of volunteers that were looking for wildlife signs while wading in the marsh. We never actually made it to Steigerwald Lake. :x
On the way back to the car we enjoying the beautiful, warm day in the sunshine!
14 Heading back toward car - Awesome!_(1).JPG
This is a fantastic hike for a bad knee or rehabilitation! :D The hike was 4.8 miles with an elevation gain of about 190ft.
Columbia River Dike Hike.JPG

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Peder
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Re: 3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by Peder » March 14th, 2013, 8:58 pm

Great pictures Mike! I really enjoy that stretch along the Columbia River for the wide ranging views.

EDIT: I think that you were being too polite to the (concrete) canoes! ;)
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Roy
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Re: 3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by Roy » March 14th, 2013, 9:26 pm

Glad you enjoyed it they sure have made a lot of nice improvements since my first rehab trip there in 95. And I have had my share, its a great place to take little ones the beach distractions are always a plus with them.

Wish you the best Mike hope that shoulder does not require surgery I had rotator cuff repair a year and a half ago outpatient surgery most pain I have experienced for an operation. Went online later and many people said same thing. Long rehab and intense PT and very import PT. One clue on your shoulder is I was mostly fine during the during the day but could not sleep very strange laying down you would think would relive it but thats common. But 7 months after the MRI and they said it needed repair I tried to ignore them but I was near a zombie state from sleep deprivation. The doc laughed and said you held out pretty darn long.

Good luck on your issues and and just keep going --- Roy
Last edited by Roy on March 14th, 2013, 9:53 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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BrianEdwards
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Re: 3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by BrianEdwards » March 14th, 2013, 9:30 pm

Looks like the recovery is going well Mike, congrats!
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Re: 3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by Stefrobrts » March 14th, 2013, 10:18 pm

Thanks for posting about this one. We haven't been out there yet, but it sounds like a good warm-up hike for this time of year. I think we'll head out there soon!
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Crusak
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Re: 3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by Crusak » March 15th, 2013, 5:35 am

Another new trail! :) Good to see you getting out again. Are you limiting yourself to one hike per week, or are you sneaking out more often?
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bobcat
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Re: 3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by bobcat » March 15th, 2013, 7:27 am

Glad to see you're flexing that knee, Mike. There is considerable wildlife to be seen along the dike - although mostly early morning and evening. I've seen beaver, bobcat, coyote, deer, eagles, etc. there.

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mileagemike25000
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Re: 3/9/13 Columbia River Dike & Steigerwald Refuge Hike

Post by mileagemike25000 » March 15th, 2013, 5:17 pm

Thanks Peder! There were so many photo opportunities and I tried to get a bit of everything. ;) Truthfully, we didn't even touch the canoes to see what they were made of and just enjoyed them for their historical value. :oops:



Roy - Thanks again for that excellent reccomendation. :D There seems to be quite a few areas to explore, including the beach area. My wife has voiced that she want to come back here on occasion due to its beautiful scenery and closeness to home. It's also the PERFECT rehab hike!

Thanks for the well wishes. :) You seem to have had more than your share of injuries and surgeries. :( I'm sorry to hear that you had to work through all that pain, but you seem to have come out of it fighting. :) I have already had an MRI and there is nothing the surgeon can do at this time. :cry: My shoulder issue is with the supraspinatus, and a cortisone shot got rid of any pain for about 3 months. Unfortunately, it has worn off and can't be injected very often (and I really don't want cortisone due to its negative effects). It can be painful, but doesn't wake me up at night. I just can't sleep on either shoulder. I have taken a majority of the backpack weight off my shoulder, and this is helping quite a bit. :)


Thanks Brian! I'm making good progress, but my job requires me to move around quite a bit. It's not healing as fast as it could be, but steady progress is all I really expect. ;)


Thanks Stephanie! It is a nice level hike that has some great scenery, and the dike seems to go on forever. :) I definitely recommend veering off the dike trail and exploring the beach and Steigerwald Wildlife Refuge! Good luck on your warm-up hike. :D



Jim - Thanks for the support! Yes, this another new trail for the wife and I. :) We're going hiking every day of the weekend. I'm just tired from work and haven't been writing a TR for all the hikes. :roll: I actually haven't missed a weekend,......even after the surgery. :oops: The Sunday after the surgery we went to Starvation Creek and walked (very, very slowly) to a waterfall just east of the parking lot. On Saturday, March 3, we hiked for 3+ miles on the Historic Columbia River Hwy trail west from Cascade Locks towards Eagle Creek. Last Sunday we hiked 6.2 miles on the Mosier Twin Tunnel trail east starting in Hood River. Sorry for not writing TR's but I've been very tired lately and have just been kicking back after work. :(



Thanks for the support Bobcat! We didn't see much more than waterfowl (the trail was fairly crowded), but did sit and watch them for a while! From your experiences, it appears you've been quite successful at observing much of the wildlife in the refuge. :o It sure doesn't seem like there's many places to hide during daylight, but then, we rarely see any large animals since we make so much noise! :lol:

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