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Making Way for New Trail
Read full post >: Making Way for New TrailBy Mark Wattier, TKO Crew Leader The Wilson River Trail goes for 24 miles through the Coast Range, sometimes following its namesake river, and sometimes diverging into the mountains. There has been talk for years about an extension to the trail, but the Oregon Department of Forestry doesn’t have much of a budget for things like new trails. This is where TKO has been able to step in and help.ODF staff flagged a 6 mile route, and TKO volunteers have begun clearing the corridor that will eventually be the new trail. This “in-kind” work helps to reduce the hit to…
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Call for Volunteers to serve as Trail Ambassadors
Read full post >: Call for Volunteers to serve as Trail AmbassadorsThis spring, Trailkeepers of Oregon, the Mt. Hood and Columbia River Gorge Regional Tourism Alliance, the U.S. Forest Service, and Oregon State Parks are kicking off another season of the Trail Ambassador Program to equip Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area and Mt. Hood visitors with information they need for a safe, informed, and positive experience when hiking in the region. The Trail Ambassador 2021 season will kick-off on April 24th and Trailkeepers of Oregon is currently seeking volunteers Volunteer Trail Ambassadors will be placed at some of the busiest trailheads in the Mt. Hood National Forest, the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area, and trails on…
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Hike of the Month: Champoeg State Park
Read full post >: Hike of the Month: Champoeg State Parkby Paul Gerald, Board Member, Trailkeepers of Oregon Distance: 3.4 or 5.8 miles – or less!Elevation gain: 120 to 300 feet A great way to welcome spring is to get yourself, and your kids if you have them, out for a short, easy walk, or just a day in the park. You might want something that isn’t too challenging, that provides a little variety, and that can easily be cut short if the weather turns sour. If all of that sounds good right now, then a visit to Champoeg State Park, on the banks of the Willamette River, might be in…
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Hike of the Month: Fort to Sea Trail
Read full post >: Hike of the Month: Fort to Sea Trailby John Sparks, Newsletter Editor, Trailkeepers of Oregon Distance: 12.9 milesElevation gain: 505 feet The National Park Service’s Fort to Sea Trail, accessible at all times of the year, follows a route that members of Lewis and Clark’s Corps of Discovery might have taken in order to commute to the Pacific Ocean. The trail was finally completed in 2005, just in time for the Lewis and Clark bicentennial celebration. Much of the trail lies within the Lewis and Clark National Historical Park, which includes Sunset Beach State Recreation Site. The trail can be hiked from either end (no fee at Sunset Beach; $10 pass…
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Hike of the Month: Clackamas River Trail
Read full post >: Hike of the Month: Clackamas River Trailby John Sparks, Newsletter Editor, Trailkeepers of Oregon Distance: 8.2 miles one-wayElevation gain: 1,550 feet The Clackamas River Trail is a perfect December outing as the area should be snow-free but less visited and the old-growth groves impart a greater majesty in the diffused light. Trailkeepers of Oregon has returned to the trail every year to patch up eroded sections of trail and improve stream crossings. There are several options here: most people prefer the 7.8 mile return trip to Pup Creek Falls from the Fish Creek Trailhead; others may wish to begin at the Indian Henry Trailhead, which requires no fee and takes you…
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TKO Board Strategizes Next 10 Years
Read full post >: TKO Board Strategizes Next 10 YearsBy Paul Gerald, Board President, Trailkeepers of Oregon As any trail crew can tell you, when you have a job to do, you need a plan. Without a plan, you can lose time, miss opportunities, create a mess, waste energy and maybe get somebody hurt. So before you work, you plan. On the Trailkeepers of Oregon Board of Directors, we had a plan, too. And then everything changed—for the better. So over the last year, we’ve been making an expansive new plan, and I want to share the core of that plan with you now. For years, TKO was a small…
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Interview: Steph Noll and the Launch of the Oregon Trails Coalition
Read full post >: Interview: Steph Noll and the Launch of the Oregon Trails CoalitionBy Michael McDowell, Newsletter Editor, Trailkeepers of Oregon Stephanie Noll is a leading force behind the Oregon Trails Coalition (OTC), an organization conceived in 2016 and formally incorporated in 2018 to advocate for trails throughout the state and to bring together agencies and organizations working with trails. Trailkeepers of Oregon serves as OTC’s fiscal sponsor. In an interview with Trailkeepers, Steph describes the origins of OTC and the work to be done to build a greater statewide trail network in Oregon. How did the Oregon Trails Coalition come into being? For me, it goes back to the days when I worked…
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Trailkeepers’ Tools: The Reinhart Hoe
Read full post >: Trailkeepers’ Tools: The Reinhart HoeBy Susan Schen, Crew Leader, Trailkeepers of Oregon The Reinhart hoe is a tool used for grubbing, especially the digging and scraping of dirt by TKO volunteer crews to create and shape trail tread. Sometimes called a “rhino” or “bendy shovel,” the tool was invented in the 1970s by Gordon Reinhart, a fire and recreation officer with the US Forest Service on the Umatilla National Forest. The head of the tool is a square-ended curved shovel blade mounted at a 90-degree angle to the handle. The Reinhart hoe is used by firefighting crews to cut fire lines, by foresters to scalp…
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Big Changes at Trailkeepers of Oregon
Read full post >: Big Changes at Trailkeepers of OregonTrailkeepers of Oregon will celebrate its tenth anniversary this year. This important milestone marks not only ten years of our work, but some big steps to build the foundation for our next decade. Chief among those is the hiring of our first Executive Director, Steve Kruger. You will hear more from Steve in the coming months, which brings us to a second announcement—our newsletter. You are now reading the first issue of what we intend to be a quarterly newsletter. We hope that you find value in keeping up with our ongoing work and reading the fun and informative articles we…
