The one thing I don’t recommend is hiking this trail on the weekends, it gets crowded FAST.
ANGELS REST PORTLAND FULL
The trail starts off at the Angels Rest Trailhead and when I arrived at 9:30am, the parking lot was full (it’s super small) so there were already cars parked up and down the road. #1 it’s really popular due to its proximity to Portland (only 35 minutes from downtown), #2 the views are phenomenal of the Columbia River Gorge, #3 the trail was recently reopened after the devastating Eagle Creek Fire in 2017. Since I was unable to spend Mother’s Day with my mom, I decided to head out and do something she loves to do, go hiking.
Points of Interest: Waterfall, river, overlook of Columbia River Gorge, wildflowers through the spring and summer Less experienced hikers should consider an alternative to this hike while these conditions exist, and all hikers with dogs or small children should consider safer alternatives. The Forest Service has reopened the trail but warns hikers to enter at their own risk because of hazardous conditions, including loose rocks, falling trees and limbs, debris flows, and damaged or blocked trails. Each team has a dedicated crew leader and assistant crew leader, and the teams are separated from each other by significant distance while remaining in radio or cell phone contact with each other throughout the day.This trail was impacted by the Eagle Creek Fire in 2017. Steve Kruger worked with the Forest Service and State Parks to get agreement on the two-team plan, which is now ongoing. Guy remained interested in developing a skilled rock team at TKO. After a few weeks, we began to realize that we could be much more productive with two teams of 12, one for tread and one for rock. For several weeks, we divided the group of 12 into two groups, one for tread work and the other for rock work, rebuilding the stacked switchbacks near the top which had suffered considerable erosion damage from the fire. Work parties have filled up almost immediately, with many new volunteers coming out to learn trail skills. (Photo by Elaine Keavney)īoth State Parks and the Forest Service have decided to limit crew size in the burn area to 12 people. He mentors volunteers in the art and skill of working with rocks and continues to come every Tuesday.Ī new rock wall supports a previously eroded section of trail that had been used as a cut-through by hikers. An assistant crew leader for Washington Trails Association with considerable experience in rock structure building, Guy began to come regularly to the work parties. Work on the first switchback, supervised by Guy Hamblen, improved an area that had previously been a tangle of exposed roots. With the understory burned, finding rocks for improving switchbacks was much easier. We also began to consider how we could improve the switchbacks by repairing eroded trail and plugging the number of cut-throughs that hikers have made when shortcutting the switchbacks. Much of the early work was deferred maintenance on this trail, improving tread in ways that had been very challenging, if not impossible, when the trail was open to the public. Once we crossed the Coopey Creek bridge, we were able to start tread work in earnest. Many of these rocks needed to be hand-placed, since if they were tossed over the edge, they might fall all the way to the bottom and trigger other rocks to follow.īefore restoration: An eroded section of the Angel’s Rest trail makes for difficult walking with intersecting tree roots and sunken areas. A TKO work party spent most of a Saturday moving rocks and stabilizing the trail across the talus slope. The talus slope remained relatively stable after the fire, but many new rocks of various sizes on the trail made hiking treacherous, particularly when carrying tools. After the first two work parties, and after a fall by a volunteer, it became clear that before others could safely traverse the talus slope about a quarter-mile from the trailhead, the tread across the rock slope needed to be improved. The work on that section was not so much restoration of fire damage as it was improving the drainage that is a chronic problem in that section of the trail. The first volunteers began work on the section just below the Coopey Creek bridge on March 3, 2018.
The Angel’s Rest Trail was heavily affected by the Eagle Creek Fire, and TKO volunteers were eager to get to work on the restoration of this popular trail.
By Elaine Keavney, Board Member, Trailkeepers of Oregon
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