Day 2 - Sep 3, 2006 Last updated: 9/13/06 1:30pm PT
On Sunday, we drove to the Silver Falls State Park. It is about 25 miles east of Salem, which is about 45 miles south of Portland. Near the north side of Salem, you pass a sign that says you’ve crossed the 45th parallel. In theory, this is halfway between the north pole and the equator. In reality, since the Earth bulges in the middle, the real halfway point is a little bit north. Not sure if the sign is adjusted for this.
At the park, we hiked most of the Trail of Ten Falls. It’s a loop trail that is 8.7 miles long, taking you past ten waterfalls. We only hiked about 6 miles, skipping the last two waterfalls, as they were far from all the others and we could drive past, and see at least one of them from the road.
First up was the South Falls. It’s 177 feet tall and you can walk behind it. In the first picture, you can see people on the trail on the left side of the picture, about half way up. This is the fall to see if you don’t feel like hiking. It’s near the parking lot. The rest of the trail does have some decent hills to climb. I wouldn’t call it a difficult hike, but it ain’t easy either. It’s a well maintained path, but you won’t need to do the stairmaster for a few days after this hike.
Other falls in order: Lower South Falls, Lower North Falls, Middle North Falls. These are probably much bigger in spring and early summer during the snow melt. The other falls didn’t photograph well, or in the case of Winter Falls, were non-existent.
Dinner was at the Thai Peacock in Portland (very good), then we headed back for a second night at Powell’s.