We had spent Christmas at home. We were waiting to go up to my mom's house until around New Years. It was a fun day and the kids enjoyed their presents as to be expected. We even did a Christmas walk out on the nature trail by the campground near our house. It was great except for the very end when there was definitely a crazy guy on drugs dancing on the trees. We even did a quick high tail it out of there which was not easy with a two and a four year old. The next day, I decided to check out a section of the McKenzie River trail that I had not hiked before. I started from Koosah Falls and headed down the trail from there.
The falls were really impressive given all the precipitation that we had been experiencing lately. The trail followed the river that was flowing quite intensely until it popped out at the reservoir. I should have looked at a map before I went, but I figured the trail would just be following the river and easy to find. In retrospect it was pretty easy to find. What I did, though, was to go left when I hit the road at the dam. Big mistake because it took me all the way to the other side of the reservoir. And who was the genius who kept going until he got to the outlet of the dam with no way to get across to the other side. You guessed it. So I had to back track which honestly was fine because I needed a bit of a hike anyway.
I found the trail which was fairly close to where I left it. There were a few other wanderers on the trail, but mostly just me as I followed the lake before popping out on the other side. From here, I was following the river downstream again. The area was almost swampy in many places and I really appreciated all of the lava flows that had carved this river valley a long time ago. This was a great hike to see big basalt cliffs. My goal on this day was to get to the Blue Pool and Tamolitch Falls. It was longer than taking the trail from Trail Bridge, but I guess it was much quieter. The river itself was not nearly as spectacular as hiking up from Trail Bridge, but I could still appreciate it.
It was almost surprising when I abruptly came upon the Blue Pool. Coming from the other direction, it was easy to anticipate from trail impact, but this way it was like I came around a corner and there it was. The waterfall was not flowing but there was quite a bit of underground stream flow coming out of the rocks. The Blue Pool is a pretty fantastic feature. I honestly didn't stay too long as I was really enjoying being out hiking today. The hike back was the same as the hike in, so I really just enjoyed the day being off work and out. The following day we were looking forward to Uncle Paul's visit which would be short and sweet. Oregon sure had a lot to offer just in our river valley.
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