Rogue River Trail – Big Bend to Clay Hill – 05/14/2021

Day two of our Southern Oregon Coast extended weekend had us visiting the Rogue River Trail for the first time. We were admittedly a bit apprehensive about this hike as we had hiked another river trail (the Illinois) in the area around the same time of year in 2016 and had been overrun with ticks on that outing. This turned out to be a much more pleasant outing with just a single tick needing to be flicked off Heather which she promptly flicked straight at me.

We started our hike at the Big Bend/Foster Bar Trailhead at the western end of the Rogue River National Recreation Trail.

It was a beautiful morning as we set off on the trail in the forest skirting a pasture.

Madia

Blue dicks

Near the half mile mark the trail passed below the Illahe Lodge where a couple of deer had their eyes on us.

The trail passed through a fence that was booby trapped with poison oak.
The poison oak trap in the afternoon.

While the relative absence of ticks was great we still aren’t accustomed to hiking with the amount of poison oak that tends to be present in the southern part of the State but we’re working on that. This hike was a good test as the majority of the first 4.5 miles of the trail passed through quite a bit of vegetation that more often than not included poison oak. We weren’t entirely sure what to make of the hikers we saw in shorts or pants that left open skin near the calves and ankles, were we being too paranoid or are they crazy? The first four miles also included a couple of climbs to bypass private land which limited the views of the river quite a bit.
Bridge over Billings Creek.

Del Norte iris

Tolmie’s mariposa lily

Douglas iris with insect.

More mariposa lilies (with a poison oak background)

Thimbleberry

The Rogue River from the trail during one of the climbs.

Henderson’s stars

One of dozens of lizards we saw (or heard).

Camas

We watched a number of rafts float by and later learned that it was the last weekend to float the river without needing a permit so it was an extra busy weekend.

We had honestly been a little underwhelmed with the trail as we reached the bridge over Flea Creek at the 4.5 mile mark. We had equated the Rogue River Trail with the dramatic views we’d seen in others photos but the section of trail up to now was short on those.
Footbridge over Flea Creek

Things changed in a hurry beyond Flea Creek though as the views opened up a bit before the trail arrived at Flora Del Falls less than a quarter mile later.

We took an extended break at the falls before continuing on another 1.75 miles to the Clay Hill Lodge where we decided to turn around. The scenery was now excellent, exactly what we had been hoping for but it was warmer than we were used to and we had more hiking to do over the next couple of days so as tempting as continuing on was, the lodge made for a good turnaround point.

Oregon sunshine

Elegant brodiaea

Yarrow

Bindweed

Poppies

Clay Hill Lodge

Rafts in Clay Hill Rapids

Winecup clarkia

We saw our only snake of the day on our return trip when we spotted our first ring-necked snake in the trail.

The rafts seemed to have given way to Jet Boats which we could hear coming well before we saw them.

We stopped again at Flora Del Falls where I was tormented by a swallow tail that just wouldn’t land.

One of the dozens of photos I took trying to get the swallow tail in flight.

After the break we headed back to the trailhead. We were trying to come up with markers to break up the 4.5 mile section and Heather remembered that Sullivan had said that there were 5 bridge crossings over named creeks. We ignored the “named creeks” detail and began counting bridges down from 5. There were well more than 5 bridge, closer to a dozen but only 5 crossed “named creeks”. Either way we made it back to the car (and past a few cows) finishing a very nice 12.9 mile hike just after 2:15pm.

After staying in Gold Beach the night before we were now headed north to Bandon for a couple of nights. We stopped for dinner in Port Orford at the Crazy Norwegian on a recommendation from Heather’s Dad. We shared a clam chowder and split the fish and chips. They were wonderful, a perfect ending to our day.

We found out a couple of days later that we had missed running into the folks from Boots on the Trail, one of our favorite hiking blogs. They had been hiking the entire trail one way and would be doing this section on Saturday the 15th, one day after our hike. We have wondered if that might happen sometime when we are down in that area and it almost did. Maybe next trip. Happy Trails!

Flickr: Rogue River Trail – Big Bend to Clay Hill Lodge