Rogue River/Medford trail recommendations

[jv44]

Hello!

I am a Seattle-based hiker and I usually skim this board whenever I am heading south to Oregon...it's a great resource!

I am spending Thanksgiving with my wife's grandmother who lives near Rogue River, OR. I am hoping to get in a few good day hikes on Friday and Saturday and would REALLY appreciate some recs. I am having a hard time getting to the bottom of what is good/seasonally appropriate in the area based on the web sites I can find via google.

I am a fairly confident hiker who usually does 7-12 mile day hikes on the weekends. I probably won't have technical equipment with me, but will have microspikes and trekking poles and don't mind elevation gain and snow as long as it's relatively easy to keep track of the trail. I will unfortunately be driving a small-ish sedan and would prefer to not put on chains, so access roads will have to be passable and mostly snow free.

So yes, please let me know what your favorite options are within an hour or two of Rogue River/Medford/Ashland! Thanks for the help, and please do let me know if there is a great web resource somewhere for this region that I am just missing out on...

[goingrouge]

Easy choice. Union Creek or the Rogue River Gorge. Both begin at the Union Creek Resort. These are low enough to not be socked in by snow (yet). Massive DFs and Ponderosas right along the creeks. These are very easy river grade hikes. If is is sunny, the scenes at the big bends in the river are worthy of painting. Also, the river goes underground, if you are into that kind of thing.

You could always go to Graves Creek on the Lower Main Rogue, but no reason to make that long drive. Also along the river, extremely rough. It is almost all on solid, irregular bedrock. It is nice this time of year, especially in the rain, when the seasonal creeks are flowing.

Grizzly Peak is good this time of year if it is sunny, and just as far a drive as Union Creek. If conditions are clear though (sunny high pressure), you can see Shasta, Pilot Rock and are on a very big prominence over Ashland.

Still though, you should go spend time on one of the lesser known Great Salmon Rivers of the West.

[CampinCarl]

+1 on what goingrouge said.

The Grants Pass Daily Courier had an journalist (Zach Urness) who put together a great resource for the area, (you may be able to access without a subscription, sometimes I can). He's now in Salem at the Statesman Journal doing great work in the Willamette Valley and statewide too!

Southern Oregon Outdoors

Go to the Trails tab to find hike descriptions.

If you have limited time you could hit the Upper and Lower Table Rocks near Central Point.

Here's a data point on snow levels- Mt. Ashland (~ 6300' at it's base) webcam

http://www.mtashland.com/SectionIndex.asp?SectionID=14