North Umpqua Trail, Mott Segment

I learned something new today. For years I had been taking photographs of a certain lichen which looked less like an actual lichen and more like a film of dry green dust of death spores from a science fiction movie. But while the lichen itself looked like dust, the fruiting bodies appeared to be more like small fungi. Because I had never seen the lichen without the fruiting bodies in immediate proximity, I had always assumed they were organs of lichen reproduction but left open the possibility that the bodies might actually be a true fungus living in a symbiotic relationship with the lichen. But while cruising the internet on an unrelated information quest, I accidentally found out the name of the lichen: Fairy Barf. 

What fairy barf looks like

Really, that's the name! I was somewhat disappointed because I always assumed that fairies farted glowing fireflies and barfed glittering rainbows. Another belief from childhood cruelly debunked! But no, fairies apparently hork up an unremarkable green dusty looking lichen. The lichen does have a scientific name and everything: icmadophila ericetorum, and you can even look it up on the Internet. Just to make sure, I did look up "fairy farts" on the Internet and found out there is a cottage industry of children's books on the subject. I wonder where these books were when I was a kid, they would have been a lot more fun to read than Dick and Jane, but I digress.

The river just looks cold

This was a midweek hike with usual suspects John, Jennifer, and Diane on our old friend the North Umpqua Trail's Mott Segment. Besides lichen, we also got to experience the North Umpqua River (from a dry distance) and springtime in a shady forest. A very shady forest. I swear, that no matter which side of the river the trail is on, it is always on the shady side. And in late winter/early spring, it's a deep cold shade.

Reflections were a thing today

All we could do was to stare wistfully at the other side of the river which was bathed in more sunlight than that side could ever need or want. All that sunlit warmth just lying around over there and they don't even share. However, the hills were bathed in sunlight and reflected poetically upon the quieter parts of the North Umpqua glowing goldish due to the second-hand sunlight. The reflections were a thing and I soon found myself behind the gang because I made frequent stops in a never-ending quest for the perfect reflection photo. I suppose I shouldn't complain so vociferously about the sun-stealing north side of the river, but a little warmth to go along with the reflections would have been nice.

Roll up the sidewalk!

There's a part of the Mott Segment that we euphemistically refer to as "The Sidewalk" because it is paved with cement down close to the river. Over time, erosion has kind of left The Sidewalk hanging a little bit higher above the river than originally intended. I don't know the story of why the need to cement this little piece of the North Umpqua Trail but no doubt hikers and mountain bikers are happy not to have to negotiate the ankle-breaking or rim-bending minefield of jagged rocks next the river. 

A saxifrage pushes up through the moss

At this primitive sidewalk a large cliff plunges straight down, landing right next to the trail. Water seeps down the cliff-face and the moist air in the river canyon also contributes to the ample moss and other water-loving vegetation hugging the cliff's facade. Saxifrage and stonecrop were some of the other flourishing plant specimens adorning the cliff in addition to the moss, the saxifrage already displaying it's dainty white flowers with distinctive pink-tipped stamens.

A platoon of British soldiers

A large log had rolled down the cliff and apparently a woodland sprite had puked on it, because a colony of fairy barf was happily thriving on the decaying log. The fairy barf was surrounded by  a rather large army of British soldiers, also a lichen but with distinctive red-caps, who were faithfully executing their duly assigned mission of capturing and arresting the miscreant fairy barf for some perceived offense.

The trail went up and down all day long

Naturally, I tarried at this spot way too long and it was pretty much a solo hike from there on in. I figured I'd walk until I encountered my fellow hikers on their way back to the trailhead. That point turned out to be within a quarter-mile of Fisher Creek, so Zane Gray's fishing camp site would have to wait for another day and another hike.

The color of the river amazes

As the afternoon wore on, the sunlight edged ever so closer to our side of the river. Whereas the river in the morning had that frigid looking slate color in the shade, now in bright afternoon sunlight the river was lit up into that vibrant and distinctive North Umpqua blue-green. During the last mile or so of the hike, some sun actually filtered down to the trail and I stood in a sunbeam, basking in the light and warmth. "It's so...(sniff)...beautiful" he said, wiping away a tear. 

Peace like a forest

Because I had so much alone time on the trail, a lot of the hike was spent pondering and ruminating upon life and the recent loss of my daughter. As I walked, the river was always nearby as it flowed below the trail. The noise of the river all hike long soothed, and I let the sound wash right over me as I walked. There is just something about the rush of a river, it's a figurative massage for the soul, rubbing out all the sore spots in one's psyche. Just call me a grateful customer of the North Umpqua Trail.

Cougar Creek, as it flows under a bridge

For more pictures of this hike, please visit the Flickr album.

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North Umpqua Trail (Mott Segment)

Even though this hike was done in early May, much of the quality of hiking in our little piece of Oregon in 2019 has been and will be determined by the aftermath of February's Snowpocalypse. The wet and heavy snow, lots of it too, knocked down tons of trees onto all the trails in our Umpqua National Forest. When you have a horizontal forest lying across most trails, well it does make it rather hard to find a trail to hike on, doesn't it?

The Forest Service crew's handiwork

The North Umpqua Trail (NUT) was no exception to the tree carnage, despite its exalted status as a National Recreation Trail. However, the Forest Service had dispatched a trail crew to clear out the Mott Segment of the venerable NUT, and at the time of this hike, that was the only segment that had been reopened following the February storm. Well, since the only other option was to hike on a closed segment and do a "boot camp" hike over, under, around, and through all the tree obstacles, we were good with hiking on the Mott Segment.

Moss covers all that does not move

Ten hikers and one dog showed up for this one and it was a happy scene as twenty boots and four paws set out on the trail on a fine spring day. The sun was shining, the sky was gloriously blue and cloudless, and the temperature was perfectly mild. Normally, I complain loudly and vociferously (some would say shrilly, even) about having to hike on the frigid shady side of the North Umpqua River but on a day like this day, the shade was equally pleasant as the sunny side of the river, temperature-wise.

The North Umpqua Trail, on a fine spring day

The day was quintessentially spring, and winter had been completely banished to nice-weather purgatory for the next six months or so. Because it was truly and fully spring, the burgeoning forest vegetation was exploding into riotous profusion along all things North Umpqua, be it trail or river. Green was the color of the day with all manner of trees, vines, shrubs, bushes, and other assorted vegetative life forms sending out vigorous leafy growth to compete for what little sun actually reaches the forest floor. 

Fern, still in the process of uncurling 

Ferns were plentiful, their rolled-up fronds still in the process of unfurling, making the curlicued polypodiophytes (ferns, in plain speak) with their curled "elephant trunks" look like some kind of strange vegetative pachyderms (fancy word for elephant-like life forms). By the way, I looked up the definition of "pachyderm" and the root words mean "thick-skinned", so I know plenty of overly sensitive hiking friends and comrades who are definitely not pachyderms in the etymological sense of the word. But I digress...

Wild ginger flowers are just weird

Wildflowers are very much a thing in spring and where there are wildflowers, there is me, lying prone on the trail photographically documenting seemingly every flower I see. My favorite flower is the wild ginger because like me, it's a little hard to find, it's brown, and it's hairy. Well, that's zero true out of three statements, but suffice to say that the flower is the very antithesis of  what a flower should look like. By the way, "Wild Ginger" used to be my stage name, but that's another sad story best left untold in a hiking blog. Bless its little brown alien-looking head though, and I soon lagged behind because of my photographic search for the perfect specimen. One other plus to wild ginger are the aromatic and flavorful leaves which taste like...well, they taste like ginger. I crumpled up a couple of the heart-shaped leaves and dropped them into my hydration bladder so I could drink refreshing ginger-flavored water for the duration of the hike.

Calypso orchids are just flamboyant

Most of the floral specie were white in color, with calypso orchid being a notable exception. The flamboyant flowers were in full samba song, dancing in a conga line across the forest floor, appearing strikingly exotic and tropical among all the staid and overly dignified conifer and maple trees. The orchid Carnaval presented yet more opportunities for me to lie prone on the ground and lag behind!

The North Umpqua River, all day long

The North Umpqua River was a constant companion on this mostly level hike, the waters glowing blue-green in the seasonal sunlight. In winter, the river runs fairly silty and can even sport the same dull muddy brown color of a wild ginger flower. But in spring, the river begins to clear up and we could see previously hidden rocks lurking just below the surface, eagerly waiting to unpleasantly surprise river kayakers and rafters. At best, if they couldn't triumphantly snag a boat, the jagged rocks are more than willing and able to snag a fishing lure or two or three or several dozen. Actually, they probably don't snag as many lures as they used to since I gave up fishing a couple of decades ago.

What vine maple does to a forest

I've already mentioned the trailside greenery, and the main donors thereof were vine maple and dogwood trees. Vine maple is probably the most photogenic tree ever, except maybe in in bare-branched winter. In autumn, the forest is seemingly set ablaze by the colorful vine maple leaves flashing with every hue and tint available in the autumnal spectrum. However, in spring the leaves only flash green, of course. Despite the monochromatic color choice, the riotous profusion of vine maple leaves will green up a forest in a hurry, and nothing says spring quite like a forest full of vine-maples adorned with new leafy growth.

Someone left the dogwood lamps on

Not to be outdone by vine maple, dogwood was also putting on a show with ample quantities of six-petaled white flowers bedecking the branches arching over the trail. Being it was a sunny day and all, the flowers and leaves were illuminated and lit up by the riverside sunlight like so many garden lamps. While the dogwood floral display gave me further camera-related reason to  lag even further behind my comrades, at least I didn't have to lie prone on the trail to take photos of the blooms.

Part of that landslide we walked across

The Mott Segment is one of the few extended stretches of  the NUT that is basically level in gradient. However, that's not to say the hike was not without a few travails, mostly in the form of trees lying across the trail, a souvenir of some recent winter storm that occurred after the trail crew had cleaned up this segment of the NUT. Piles of sawn logs lay off to one side of the trail in testament to the hard work of the USFS trail crew to make this trail hike-ready (Thank you!). Unfortunately, their work is still incomplete, for a fairly sizeable landslide sprawled over and on the trail, forcing us to scramble across the face of the slide with all its tons of debris poised above, seemingly ready to slide again at the slightest triggering provocation (like scrambling hikers!). I'm glad to report that no land slid as we carefully made our way across.

Timber Creek, flows across the trail

Several large creeks (Fisher, Timber, Cougar, John, and Wright, to enumerate all the named creeks), run across the NUT but fortunately, rustic footbridges got us across each one without any dainty hikers having to wet their feet. The bridges made for nice photographic vantage points and the creeks soon separated our group of hikers into those with cameras and those without.

Fisher Creek at Zane Gray's camp

Fisher Creek is the site of Zane Gray's fishing camp and us older hikers enjoy tormenting the younger set by asking them if they know who Zane Gray was. Cruel to be sure, but it is funny to see that panicked look on their faces, the same look a student who did not do the homework assignment gets when unexpectedly called upon by the teacher. I don't have any other funny stories to tell or fabricate about the other creeks, but they were nice to look at as we hiked by.

The end of the road

Unfortunately and sadly, we arrived at a meadow just after we crossed Wright Creek. It was a crying shame too, for the meadow marked the end of our hike and nobody really wanted to stop hiking on such a beautiful day.

Morels are just $36 per pound at your local supermarket

For more photos of this hike, please visit the Flickr album.

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North Umpqua Trail - Tioga Segment

The last couple of years, backpacking the 79-mile North Umpqua Trail (or NUT) had been on the calendar for a grand summer adventure. And in the last couple of years, forest fires have ensured that I hike somewhere else other than on the North Umpqua Trail. However, the 2017 North Umpqua Fire was a doozy, hanging around the North Umpqua River (and trail) for most of the summer, smothering Roseburg in thick choking smoke for the duration thereof. After that fire, the North Umpqua Trail was closed for quite some time while the Forest Service cleared the trail of downed trees, replaced bridges, and put new trail in over landslides. Just recently, the closed sections of the NUT had been reopened, giving us hikers an opportunity to assess the damage.

Now, I've always found burn areas to be beautiful in their own way. Acres and acres of silver snags point upward to a blue sky, pleasing both eye and camera; small songbirds twitter and flitter about; woodpeckers jackhammer the dead trees; and fireweed explodes in flowery exuberance on the forest floor. But, to be honest, I usually hike the burn zones long after the fires have subsided. This would be a rare opportunity to explore a fire-charred forest within a year of the last flames being extinguished.

In case I didn't know or notice

Luna (my dog) and I set out on the trail under gray and threatening sky. It had rained on the drive to the Wright Creek Trailhead but for the moment, the rain let up. What did not let up was Luna's compulsion to be be the one in front. I had to continually assert myself as the Alpha Dog, which I did by extending my hiking pole sideways, blocking her way to the front of the line, lightly rapping her on the nose and noggin should she not get the hint. Relentless, she started bushwhacking up and around the reach of those pesky and irritating titanium dog-smacking hiking poles. If this keeps up, electricity will soon be involved when we hike.

The undergrowth already is reclaiming the forest

But this is not a dog-training blog, and enough already about my canine-related travails. At the trailhead, a brand new sign warned of falling rocks and debris, due to the recent fire. And just in case all the dead trees weren't clue enough, the sign also advised we were about to enter a burned area. Undeterred by the warning, we headed up the trail and it was immediately apparent that death would be the theme of the day. Miles and miles of dead and scorched trees, not yet going photogenically skeletal white. You could almost still smell the smoke, and the ground was covered by a layer of dry pine needles dropped from dead or dying trees. The gray and overcast sky matched the mood perfectly.

Rain on oxalis

Despite the destruction wrought by the fire, there was still plenty of life to be found. The undergrowth was vigorous and robust, consisting of fireweed, wild rose, candy flower, vanilla leaf, and wild ginger, just to namedrop a few. Dense carpets of oxalis covered the damper segments of trail, with water drops beading on the clover-like leaves in camera-pleasing fashion. Unfortunately, the increased sunlight due to the lack of trees led to a robust outburst of poison oak but at least the leaves were turning red, imparting a hint of autumn to the trail. Nothing kills poison oak, not even an immolating forest fire.

How madrone survives fire

Fire is a part of the cycle of life of a forest and it was interesting to see how the trees handled the fire. Madrone sends up new growth from its roots and it was quite common to see green shoots circling the base of a dead or dying tree. The thick bark of the Douglas fir is the first line of defense from the heat of a fire and larger trees had blackened trunks but green tops, while younger trees did not survive the fire at all.

What was this guy doing in a burn zone?

There wasn't much in the way of wildlife in the unusually quiet forest, apart from a few twittering birds. Didn't see any sign of elk, deer, bear, or scat thereof on the trail. I have no doubt though, that come next spring, the forest will nevertheless be populated by an overwhelming population of mosquitoes and poison oak bushes. Hmm, maybe things that make you itch are resistant to all potential mechanisms of extinction, including a searing forest fire. That therory would also bode well for ticks, regrettably. However, most surprisingly, I did encounter a forest snail slithering on the trail. How on earth did that snail survive the fire?

Thunder Creek, on its way to the North Umpqua River

At about the two mile mark, Thunder Creek came into view, waterfalling down the steep slope as the creek tumbled toward the mostly hidden North Umpqua River.  Amazingly, the wooden bridge spanning Thunder Creek had survived the fire intact and untouched. No doubt, humidity from the creek played a significant part in the preservation of the rustic footbridge. The creek was not thundering much, as it was running low this late into summer. From the creek crossing, the NUT then headed uphill to the first of two rocky points of interest.

View of the fire-damaged forest

The first point required a bushwhack over burned and fallen trees to a rocky overlook of the North Umpqua River canyon. The river was maybe a hundred feet below but just one step away, if one were so inclined or careless enough to do that. We weren't so inclined, so we stayed safely in the middle of the promontory, my hand firmly holding onto the dog leash. I am the Alpha Dog, remember? On the crown of the point, several madrones were severely singed yet their crowns still were a leafy green, with orange limbs and trunks interwoven into a dense tangle beneath the leaves. Looking down the canyon, the forest was a patchwork quilt of live and dead trees. That was kind of surprising, because from our firsthand experience, it seemed like it was all dead forest when hiking through it.

This bench survived while surrounding bushes did not

Continuing on further, we hiked to a more prominent point referred to as Elevation Rock by my hiking crowd, although it is nameless on the map. This overlook served up an epic view of the North Umpqua River curving around a bend, with the North Umpqua Highway following the river on the opposite side. No, this is not your remote and isolated wilderness hike. The forested hills surrounding the canyon all disappeared into the cloud cover as we sat on a bench and ate lunch. The aforementioned bench has always been one of my favorite benches and I was overjoyed to see that it too, had survived the fire.

Old wasp nest on the trail

By this time, I really had gotten tired and irritated at having to continually assert my dominance over one of the most bone-headed life forms on this planet. I would have let Luna loose, but she has no filters and is liable to disappear off trail in search of a squirrel or swim, or maybe a squirrel and a swim, or a swimming squirrel even. My option was to continue the fight for another 1.5 miles of trail down to Fox Creek, or give up the venture for now. Not sure what this says about my Alpha-Doggedness, but we cut the hike short and headed back to the car, happy with a short 6 mile hike.

Itchy, itchy!

So, back down the trail we went, this time stopping to photograph the red poison oak leaves. I felt sort of unclean and itchy doing that, but I'm glad to report that my camera did not develop a skin rash within a week of this hike. If there was any justice in  this world, mosquitoes would bite poison oak leaves and both life forms would then know of the itchy madness they spread. But alas, there is no justice in this world, and I'm sure they will both be waiting for me when I finally get to backpack the North Umpqua Trail.

Pine needles covered all

For more pictures of this hike, please visit the Flickr album.

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