Oregon Hikers

Labor Day called for a short drive to a short hike just to get out for awhile but not deal with holiday weekend crowds. Plus a little bonus I'd been waiting to try for a long time since we had plenty of xtra time..
A little different opening shot for a waterfall hike.. eyeing the best options to go behind the falls..


Into the mist and spray..





And out..


They could charge people $$ for this..


Or better yet, I should have stuck around and offered rides for $5 or $10 a pop..


Oh yeah, there is a hike... Upper Butte Creek Falls without the kayak..


From behind Upper Butte Creek Falls..





Butte Creek Falls Trail between the two waterfalls..


Lower Butte Creek Falls. You don't get good light here on a sunny morning..


And let's make one last run thru the falls, from the back this time..








And yes, the water is cold...


That was fun
Especially after all the 15 mile hikes lately..
Album here http://picasaweb.google.com/pdxgene/ButteCreekFalls3
Happy Labor Day!

Nice pics from behind the falls gene! We snuck out for a quick morning hike on Gales Creek this morning and managed to miss the crowds and traffic too. What a great place we live in

Hey, thanx Sean.. It was amazingly quiet. Cars started rolling in as were leaving but at that point, who cares..

I did want to add we spotted a fairly decent sized middle falls between the two regular ones. It looked like it could be approached from walking downstream on the near side to at least the top of it. And there's a nice little shelf above it down below. We just couldn't tell from the trail if you could get from the top of the falls down to that shelf, the view was just too blocked off by the bushes. Something to explore some other day but I was wondering if anyone had noticed it before..

Thanks, Gene! That's one of my favorite little trails -- beautifully renovated in recent years, too. Hats off to the Oregon Dept. of Forestry and the Santiam State Forest for their work there! (...now if they could just pull back on the heavy logging around this little island of big trees... but good to see them evolving toward recreation, one little gent at a time..!)

Tom