Tumalo Falls hike
We went out to see if we could extend our hike that we took before up Tumalo Falls, and beyond on the North Fork Trail. However, it turned out that the road was closed and gated about 2.5 miles before the falls. So we had to spend quite a bit of time hoofing it along the road to make it to the Falls. There were patches of snow at the Falls and we climbed up the trail to take a look at the falls. We then continued up the North Fork trail, but could not get too far before we encountered very slippery and icy conditions and had to turn back. We did have microspikes back down at the place We were staying, but forgot to bring them with us.
We then came down and took the Bridge Creek trail that goes into the bend watershed. There were some really nice falls up there as well, even though we only went about a quarter of a mile. I would like to take that trail further as well. It was starting to rain off and on as we came down the hill and down the road. We found a utility trail that ran parallel to the road between the road and the river. We were able to read about how the bridge Creek fire had really destroyed the river because loggers came in afterwards and stripped the landscape of all the trees. There has been a lot of restoration work done here to put back woody debris along the river and keep it from silting up so badly.