Hike to Warrior Rock Lighthouse

On Saturday, the weather was supposed to be warm and sunny. We decided to go to Sauvie Island. We'd been there a couple other times to pick berries and to geocache. The wildlife area is supposed to be a great place to see birds, especially in the fall and winter.

We decided to park at the end of Reeder road and hike the trail to Warrior Rock Lighthouse. The map is from our copy of Best Easy Day Hikes - Portland, Oregon. It's a nice flat hike with some sections along the beach and others in the forest.

As soon as we got out of the car, it started sleeting. Not a good sign, but we were already there and properly dressed so we decided to keep going.

Snow Geese - Chen caerulescens

and

Canada Geese - Branta canadensis

When we were about halfway up Reeder Road, we saw all these geese grazing in the fields. As it turned out, they were nearly the only birds we saw the entire day.

Poor Little Fish

I was surprised to see this little guy just laying on the beach. He was dead already, but I would have figured some bird would've been glad to have such an easy dinner.

Normally Sami doesn't like to hike, but he decided that this trail was flat and therefore OK. We hiked a total of about 7.5 miles

Black Cottonwood - Populus balsamifera ssp. trichocarpa

The trail was completely covered in these beautiful yellow hearts.

Interesting orange mushrooms

We are now the owners of two very good mushroom books, All That the Rain Promises and More and Mushrooms of Northwest North America. Although I searched both books to try and identify this species, I still have no idea what it might be.

Warrior Rock Lighthouse seen from River View cache.

The lighthouse didn't seem so exciting, so we continued past it to a nearby geocache.

Just as we arrived at the cache site, this kayaker approached the tip of the island. We waited for him to pass before retrieving the cache.

Bricks and other debris at the North end of Sauvie Island

There were several fan shaped concrete slabs and an old broken down pier at this end of the island, but I haven't found any information as to why they were there. I can only assume they were part of homes or businesses built before this was a wildlife area.

Boise Cascade Mill

We headed to another geocache on the west side of the point and came across this mill. It's not on the island, but across the Multnomah Channel in St. Helens, OR.

Natural Bird House

On our hike back Sami noticed this hole in an old snag. Some bird definitely lives there. However, like all the other birds, he was not to be seen on this hike.

Barge heading South on the Columbia River

Snowberry - Symphoricarpos albus

Sometimes we forget that Portland is a major port. Then we see a boat like this and we're reminded once again.

Sunset at the Eastside Viewing Platform

We couldn't walk beyond the platform into the wildlife area because it's hunting season, but we did see a very nice (and very quick) sunset.

Ironically, it's mainly the hunters and not the birders or other environmentalists that pay for the protection of these great wildlife areas.