Category: Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument

Southern Oregon & Northern California

Post author By derwoodynck
Post date November 6, 2023
9 Comments on Southern Oregon & Northern California

Several years ago we set a goal for ourselves to hike all 500 featured hikes in William L. Sullivan’s “100 Hikes…” series of guidebooks (post). In 2020 we completed the first of these books covering the Central Oregon Cascades (post). We followed that up by completing a pair of books in 2021 starting with Sullivan’s “100 Hikes/Travel Guide Oregon Coast and Coast Range” 3rd edition (post) followed up by “100 HIkes/Travel Guide Northwest Oregon & Southwest Washington” 4th edition (post).

Generally speaking in order to check a hike off our list we need to have hiked a substantial portion of Sullivan’s described hike or visited the main attraction(s) he identifies for the hike. For 66 of the hikes we followed the books described route. For the other 34 hikes various factors contributed to us not completing all of each featured hike. For some we started at a different trailhead, others had portions of trail(s) closed when we visited, and several had longer options that would have required multiple days to complete. In some other cases we did slightly different routes, sometimes by accident.

The area covered by Sullivan in this book, as the title suggests includes parts of Southern Oregon and Northern California. It contains his southernmost featured hike, Caribou Lakes. In general the area covered in Oregon begins just North of Roseburg extending East to Highway 97 (with the exception being Klamath Falls which is included in his Eastern Oregon book), South to California, and West to Marial on the Rogue River. In California the area extends south to the Trinity Alps Wilderness, West to the Siskiyou Wilderness, and East to the Mount Shasta Wilderness.

The hikes inside the red lines represent the location of the featured hikes.

In addition to the three wilderness areas in California mentioned above the featured hikes included visits to the Marble Mountain, Castle Crags, Russian, and Red Buttes Wilderness areas in California. Wilderness areas in Oregon included the Red Buttes (OR & CA share this wilderness), Kalmiopsis, Wild Rogue, Soda Mountain, Mountain Lakes, Sky Lakes, Rogue-Umpqua Divide, Boulder Creek, and Mt. Thielsen.

In addition to the 15 designated wilderness areas there were hikes in two National Monuments – Oregon Caves & Cascade-Siskiyou, and Crater Lake National Park.

#1 North Bank Ranch-Hiked 6/5/2015 6/25/2023

#2 Fall Creek Falls-Hiked 6/13/2022 8/7/2022 6/25/2023
Fall Creek Falls
#3 Little River Waterfalls-Hiked 8/7/2022
Yasko Falls
#4 Boulder Creek-Hiked 9/7/2020

#5 Twin Lakes-Hiked 6/14/2022

#6 Fish Lake-Hiked 9/3/2022

#7 Buckey and Cliff Lakes-Hiked 9/3/2022

#8 Umpqua Hot Springs-Hiked 6/13/2022

#9 Toketee and Watson Falls-Hiked 6/13/2022

#10 Lemolo Falls-Hiked 6/13/2022

#11 Cowhorn Mountain-Hiked 9/15/2016

#12 Miller and Maidu Lakes-Hiked 8/1/2012

#13 Tipsoo Peak-Hiked 10/2/2014

#14 Thielsen Creek-Hiked 8/8/2020

#15 Mount Thielsen-Hiked 9/23/2012

#16 Diamond Lake-Hiked 9/5/2020

#17 Mount Bailey-Hiked 8/12/2012

#18 Boundary Springs-Hiked 6/13/2014

#19 Park Headquarters-Hiked 7/31/2023

#20 Garfield Peak-Hiked 7/31/2023

#21 Discovery Point-Hiked 9/19/2022

#22 The Watchman-Hiked 8/12/2012 7/31/2023

#23 Wizard Island-Hiked 8/1/2023

#24 Mount Scott-Hiked 10/2/2014

#25 Plaikni Falls and The Pinnacles-Hiked 7/30/2023

#26 Crater Peak-Hiked 7/30/2023

#27 Annie Creek & Godfrey Glen-Hiked 7/30/2023 7/31/2023

#28 Union Peak-Hiked 9/17/2022

#29 Upper and Lower Table Rocks-Hiked 6/9/2017 (Lower) & 5/26/2022 (Upper)
Lower Table Rock

View from Upper Table Rock
#30 Lost Creek Lake-Hiked 6/9/2017

#31 Takelma Gorge-Hiked 10/15/2020

#32 Natural Bridge-Hiked 10/16/2020

#33 Union Creek-Hiked 10/17/2020 9/20/2022

#34 Abbott Butte-Hiked 10/17/2020

#35 Hershberger Mountain-Hiked 10/16/2020

#36 Muir Creek-Hiked 5/27/2018

#37 Rattlesnake Mountain-Hiked 9/6/2020

#38 Seven Lakes West-Hiked 9/9/2023

#39 Seven Lakes East-Hiked 9/9/2023

#40 Blue Lake Basin-Hiked 9/18/2022

#41 Mount McLoughlin-Hiked 8/27/2016

#42 Fourmile Lake-Hiked 8/26/2016

#43 Sky Lakes via Cold Springs-Hiked 9/24/2022

#44 Sky Lakes via Nannie Creek-Hiked 9/24/2022

#45 Fish Lake-Hiked 10/7/2018

#46 Brown Mountain Lava Flow-Hiked 8/28/2016

#47 Lake of the Woods-Hiked 10/7/2018

#48 Mountain Lakes-Hiked 8/25/2016

#49 Soda Mountain-Hiked 6/3/2015

#50 Pilot Rock-Hiked 7/29/2017

#51 Mount Ashland Meadows-Hiked 6/3/2015

#52 Lithia Park-Hiked 6/2/2015

#53 Bandersnatch Trail-Hiked 6/17/2022

#54 White Rabbit Trail-Hiked 6/17/2022

#55 Grizzly Peak-Hiked 6/5/2015

#56 Roxy Ann Peak-Hiked 5/30/2022

#57 Wagner Butte-Hiked 6/4/2015

#58 Siskiyou Gap-Hiked 6/16/2022

#59 Jack-Ash Trail-Hiked 5/27/2022

#60 Sterling Ditch Tunnel-Hiked 6/10/2017 5/2/2023

#61 Jacksonville-Hiked 6/8/2017

#62 Enchanted Forest-Hiked 6/11/2017

#63 Observation Peak-Hiked 6/15/2022

#64 Collings Mountain-Hiked 6/8/2017

#65 Applegate Lake-Hiked 6/8/2017 5/29/2022

#66 Red Buttes-Hiked 10/27/2015

#67 Frog Pond-Hiked 6/18/2022

#68 Azalea Lake-Hiked 10/26/2015

#69 Sturgis Fork-Hiked 10/7/2023

#70 Grayback Mountain-Hiked 10/9/2023

#71 Oregon Caves-Hiked 10/30/2015

#72 Mount Elijah-Hiked 10/7/2023

#73 Sucker Creek-Hiked 10/26/2015

#74 Tanner Lakes-Hiked 10/8/2023

#75 Bolan Lake-Hiked 10/8/2023

#76 Polar Bear Gap-Hiked 7/1/2022

#77 Raspberry Lake-Hiked 7/3/2022

#78 Devils Punchbowl-Hiked 7/2/2022

#79 Rough and Ready Creeks-Hiked 5/12/2017

#80 Babyfoot Lake-Hiked 10/9/2023

#81 Eight Dollar Mountain-Hiked 5/4/2023

#82 Illinois River Beaches-Hiked 5/4/2023

#83 Grants Pass Nature Trails 5/3/2023

#84 Rouge River Trail East-Hiked 5/1/2023

#85 Rogue River Trail West-Hiked 6/24/2023

#86 Paradise Lake-Hiked 6/28/2016

#87 Sky High Lakes-Hiked 6/29/2016

#88 Campbell Lake-Hiked 6/27/2016

#89 Paynes Lake-Hiked 7/24/2017

#90 Russian Lake-Hiked 8/24/2022

#91 Hidden & South Fork Lakes-Hiked 8/26/2022

#92 Trail Gulch Lake-Hiked 8/25/2022

#93 East Boulder Lake-Hiked 8/23/2022

#94 Kangaroo Lake-Hiked 7/23/2017

#95 Deadfall Lakes-Hiked 7/25/2017

#96 Caribou Lake-Hiked 7/27/2017

#97 Castle Lake-Hiked 7/26/2017

#98 Castle Crags-Hiked 7/26/2017

#99 Black Butte-Hiked 7/28/2017

#100 Mount Shasta Meadows-Hiked 8/22/2022

In our minds this was by far the most challenging area to finish even though we did so before completing Eastern Oregon. The difficulty with Eastern Oregon mostly revolves around distance from Salem and the size of the area covered. The Southern Oregon-Northern California area is smaller and the hikes not as far away, but it involved a lot of trails that frankly don’t see the level of maintenance that most of the other areas receive. While we’ve encountered rough trails, all over poison oak is much more prevalent down south which doesn’t invite pushing through overgrown tread or bushwacking around obstacles. This area has also been hit harder by fires over the last couple of decades leaving extra work to reopen them as well as remove additional blowdown as the dead trees fall over. When the conditions were good though the scenery and diverse plant and wildlife made for some spectacular hikes. There are many that we’d love to do again and several non-featured hikes that we have in our future plans, so we aren’t done with area yet. Happy Trails!

Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument Hiking Oregon Trip report

Pilot Rock

On our way home from Mount Shasta City we stopped for a quick hike to Pilot Rock in Oregon’s Soda Mountain Wilderness. We took exit 1 from Interstate 5 and drove north on Old Highway 99 for 6.9 miles to Pilot Rock Road (Road 40-2E-33) where we turned east. Instead of starting at the Pilot Rock Trailhead which is located 2 miles up the road we parked after a mile at the Pacific Crest Trail crossing. (If you do start here be sure not to block the private driveway.)

From the road Mt. Ashland to the west and Mt. McLoughlin to the north were visible in the morning light.

We headed south on the PCT (which ironically meant we were going northbound due to the route the trail takes after crossing I-5).

Most of the flowers were finished but by the looks of things there had been quite a few. A number of late bloomers remained and along with those were some juicy thimbleberries.

Aside from a couple of very short uphills the trail seemed fairly level and after about 3/4 of a mile Pilot Rock came into view.

After another .9 miles we arrived at a junction with the closed road that serves as the trail from the official Pilot Rock Trailhead.

The two trails joined for .2 miles passing through a nice forest before splitting once again.

We forked to the right following the Pilot Rock pointer. This trail was much steeper and we climbed about 600′ in .7 miles to the base of Pilot Rock.

In a perfect world we would have scrambled up to the top of the rock which wasn’t that much higher, but after hiking 80 plus miles and climbing at least 20,000′ over the previous 7 days we weren’t sure that we had the strength and muscle control left to safely climb to and descend from the top.

Rather than risk it we stopped just below the first section where we definitely would have need to use our hands to go any higher.

We returned the way we’d come. Starting at the PCT put the hike at a little under 5 miles a little less than double what it would have been from the Pilot Rock Trailhead with some nice scenery which would have been even better earlier in the year when the numerous flowers were still in bloom. Happy Trails!

Flickr: Pilot Rock

Tags hiking, Oregon, Pacific Crest Trail, PCT, pilot rock, Pilot Rock Road, Pilot Rock Trailhead, soda mountain wilderness, Thimbleberry

Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument Hiking Oregon Trip report

Boccard Point – Soda Mountain Wilderness

Post author By derwoodynck
Post date June 7, 2015
4 Comments on Boccard Point – Soda Mountain Wilderness

After attending Pericles the day before we spent our third day in the Ashland area hiking. We were staying east of town at the Green Springs Inn and Cabins on Highway 66 in the Cascade-Siskyou National Monument under two miles from where the Pacific Crest Trail crosses that highway on its trek from Mexico to Canada. We were also only 20 minutes from the Hobart Bluff Trailhead where the PCT crosses Soda Mountain Road as it emerges from the Soda Mountain Wilderness. Our hike to Boccard Point started at the Hobart Bluff TH, but instead of heading north on the PCT toward Hobart Bluff we headed south into the wilderness. It was a damp and foggy morning as we set off.

We spotted a number of different flowers before we even made it into the wilderness.

Shortly after passing under some powerlines we entered the wilderness.

The flower show continued as the trail passed several rocky meadows.

The PCT also traveled through some more forested areas with other flowers.

After 2.9 miles at a large wilderness sign the PCT meets an old road junction. Here we left the PCT and headed deeper into the wilderness on an abandoned road just to the left of the sign.

Along this stretch of trail the old road curved around a damp wildflower meadow where there were many nearby birds and other wildlife.

We had been in the fog almost the entire hike but just as we were starting the final quarter mile stretch to Boccard Point we emerged from under the clouds and were greeted with a view of Mt. Shasta.

As the rocky outcrop of Boccard Point approached the views to the south kept getting better.

To our right the edge of the clouds were lapping over Pilot Rock.

To the left the clouds were busy drifting over the lookout tower on the summit of Soda Mountain.

And behind us was the cloud that we had spent the morning in.

The rocky terrain around Boccard Point was also dotted with wildflowers.

We headed back under the cloud. On the way back by the damp meadow we spotted more wildlife including a pair of deer that Heather spied.

The fog had at least lifted as we traveled back to the trailhead revealing more of the meadows we had passed earlier that morning.

We skipped heading up to the lookout based on the cloud situation given the views we did get on Boccard Point. The total distance for the hike ended up being 10.5 miles with only about 1200′ of elevation gain. It was a gentle enough hike that we decided to head out again that afternoon after a brief rest back at the Green Springs Inn and Cabins. Happy Trails!

flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/9319235@N02/sets/72157653708085508

Tags ashland, boccard point, hiking, hobart bluff, Mt. Shasta Area, Oregon, Pacific Crest Trail, PCT, pilot rock, soda mountain, soda mountain wilderness