Day 14

My last day in Portland and I decided to head back to the Colombia River Gorge to do some hiking with decent light. The weather that day was cloudy and overcast; as it is often in Portland so decided to do a hike in the gorge near the river and not to a vista that would likely be shrouded in clouds. After checking out a map of the region, I decided to hike the Onenata Trail which hits several waterfalls including Horsetail falls.

The hike was beautiful beautiful over the several mile trail but about halfway through I came to a realization... On every hike I take there is a really steep section where you keep climbing, muscles burn, heart pumping fast, shallow breathing, etc. Immediately, following every really steep section like that there is a section of trail where you seem to go back down a lose all the precious elevation you just gained. What's the deal with all this up, down, up, down, up, down, etc. on every single trail. It's really frustrating and it happened constantly on this hike. I'm sure there is an excellent reason for this but it couldn't come up with it, if anybody knows please share!

Some pictures from the hike are below:

A small unnamed waterfall near the start of the trail.

View of the Colombia River Gorge I found doing a little exploring off the beaten path, notice how cloudy it is Portland. Apparently this is normal and results in Seasonal Affective Disorder or SAD which is a really problem for some people in the Pacific Northwest.

Upper Horsetail falls, notice how the water falls away from the cliff into a slight curve similar to a horse's tail.

The trail actually continues into a cave of sorts where you hike behind upper horsetail fall, which is a pretty interesting perspective of a waterfall you rarely see.

Further down the trail, we saw Lower Horsetail which is MUCH taller than upper with a couple distinct levels.

I decided to break out my macro lens which allows me to take very detailed pictures of small things. It's a nice change of pace from shooting huge waterfalls and really forces me to focus on the details around me to find interesting things to shoot. Macro photography is a lot of fun for me since I can spend hours in a very small area taking pictures of things we normally walk right by.

After a full day in the Colombia Gorge, I had to drive back to Portland catch my next JetBlue flight. After making the quick drive back to the city and dropping my rental car back to Enterprise I boarded my flight to Long Beach, California. I'd never spent any length of time in Southern California before and was looking forward to the experience. The main reason for this trip was a meetup of a couple dozen other Jet Blue All You Can Jetters to visit quite possibly the best game show ever... The Price is Right!

I landed in Long Beach at 8 PM and after getting a free rental car upgrade to a Toyota Camry Hybrid, how appropriate for southern California is that? I drove the long drive from Long Beach to Burbank where the CBS studios are. I met a couple other Jet Bluer's at a motel right next to the studio and we crashed for the night. Dreaming of winning big on the Price is Right; stay tuned for my next update to see how I did.

As always any questions / comments please post below or email me at chris@pricelessperspectives.com