Oddwater

I'd seen billboards for Oddwater, but didn't really know anything about it until I saw this in today's paper. Cool. I wanna go there.

Oddwater has beautiful fish swimming through beautiful glass

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.

Tillamook Forest Center and Bayocean Spit

The weather forecast had predicted that Sunday and Monday would be nice. Since Sami and I had Monday off for Veterans Day we made tentative plans with Aaron to go to the beach. (His parents have a house in Tillamook.)

Saturday morning was beautiful so Sami and I decided we better take advantage of it. We headed down Hwy 6 towards the coast and stopped at the impressive new Tillamook Forest Center.

This replica lookout tower is not very tall or on a hill so the view wasn't as nice as I'd hoped, but it's set up with a bed and stove and all the other things the real towers had back in the 50's and there are very informative signs explaining everything.

One of the most interesting things in the tower was this insulated stool made by putting glass insulators on the feet of a regular wooden stool. The people who lived in these towers had to stand on the stool during electrical storms so they wouldn't be electrocuted. (Fortunately there aren't too many of those in this part of the country.)

View of the Forest Center from the Tower.

This doesn't look like much from the outside, but the center is actually very pretty on the inside with vaulted ceilings and large windows and beautiful views of the forest.

The pool in front of the center is reclaimed rainwater to be used in case of fire.

The Wilson River runs right past the Forest Center. Salmon are common in this river. There was a free lecture shortly after we arrived, so we learned a little about the life cycle of Salmon and how to identify the 5 types that we have in Oregon.

After the lecture we went to the large suspension bridge behind the building to see if we could see some Salmon in the river. Our guide had a couple of dead ones that had washed ashore after mating that morning, but we didn't manage to see any live ones.

While on the bridge, we saw the very cute American Dipper (Cinclus mexicanus) diving in the water to eat bugs. He's very small and fast though, so I didn't get a photo.

This picture is a boat ramp on the Wilson River. We found a geocache there and couldn't believe how steep the ramp was. I think you'd need a winch on your truck to get a boat up (or down) this thing and it still would be a bit scary. Another view here.

Orange Peel Fungus - Aleuria aurantia

Just outside the Forest center we saw this interesting orange fungus, and another wrinkly brain-like brown one.

After visiting the Forest center, we did a couple more geocaches in the area, where we saw more mushrooms including some that looked like little umbrellas, and others shaped like seashells.

Shore Pine - Pinus contorta var. contorta

In its regular upright form, pinus contorta is called Lodgepole pine.

When we arrived in the Town of Tillamook, home of the famous cheese factory, we decided to drive south around the bay and ended up on the Oceanbay Spit.

We'd never been there before, but the GPSr showed 3 caches on the spit, and we decided to hike down the path towards them.

Young Bald Eagle - Haliaeetus leucocephalus

The first part of the hike was flat and level, with views of the bay on one side and the ocean on the other. (Map)

We learned from the description on one of the geocaches that during the early 1900s there was a resort town on the spit called Bayocean (story here), but it fell into the ocean and was never rebuilt.

As the path headed north, we hiked though a heavily forested area where Sami found mushrooms that looked like a kind he used to pick in Finland.

We happened to have plastic bag with us, and he picked a gallon to take home. After we got home, he started to worry that they were not the kind he knew and so they're just sitting in our fridge while he tries to identify them.

When we came out of the forest we saw the eagle pictured above. At the time, we thought he was a different sort of eagle since the feathers on his head are not very white. After trying to ID the bird, I learned that the young Bald Eagles are brownish all over.

Elk - Cervus canadensis

On the beach we somehow took the wrong trail and couldn't get to the cache. Thick forests of shorepine and salal kept prevented us from getting any closer than 500ft.

We turned a corner and were surprised by a herd of elk. Since it was getting dark and the sun was setting, we decided we better head back to the car. Even though we didn't get close to any of the caches, it was a nice hike and we saw some cool animals.

Mostly Mushrooms

I had a doctor's appointment this morning. It happened to be right across the street from the Tualatin Hills Nature Park. The weather was beautiful and I couldn't resist taking a walk though the park. I found a ton of interesting mushrooms and various little critters. I wish I knew more about mushrooms. I'm sure some of these are tasty and some would probably kill me, but I have no idea which are which.

Licorice Fern in Bigleaf Maple tree

Polypodium glycyrrhiza

Acer macrophyllum

Mycena sp.

The mushroom ID book says that Mycena means mushroom in Greek.

To identify the particular species you'd have to look at this one under a microscope.

Garter Snake - Thamnophis sp.

Fish in a Tree

This was my lunchtime entertainment at work today. :)