Battle Axe Summit via Whetstone, Twin Lakes, Elk Lake

Note: this trail is closed due to fire damage. For more updates, please visit the Forest Service website.  The Opal Creek pools are a wonderful place to visit year-round, but they’re a true oasis on a hot summer day. With a variety of rock outcroppings and ledges to jump off of, and plenty of room to spread out for a picnic, this is a summertime magnet. Accessing the pools is a gift in and of...

On Saturday, I slid into the backseat alongside weekend belongings crammed in the car trunk. Backpacks with patches and streaks of dust. Bags of food that could be cooked over the flames of a fire.We drove south on the 5, leaving Portland and crossing through Salem, as Lake Street Dive albums played loud over the car stereo. Turned east on Highway 22, and then north onto North Fork Road, where ...

To get there from Salem, Follow Hwy. 22 east to Mehama. Turn on Little North Santiam Road (FS 2209) and proceed for 12 miles to Three Pools Day Use Area. Three Pools is by far one of the most popular swimming holes in the Northwest. With multiple swimming holes within just feet from one another it attracts over 15,000 people a year. Super clear water with a couple different locations to cliff j...

The trail is a washed out, old mining road making its way through a lush forest with a mix of ferns, moss covered trees, and towering Douglas Firs with trees blown over from wind storms lining both sides of the trail. I call those Big Foot traps. The trail comes to a fork, stay to the left you are half way there. Once you travel another 50-80ft you will see the Henline falls Trail sign on a tre...

The Santiam Forest is well known for its many beautiful spots, but this one is fairly uncommon. It's likely you will be the only person out here. Since it's such a short hike, just about a mile round trip, you could easily make it a pit stop on your way to or from someplace else and not have to worry about being too tired to be able to make. It's a short and fairly steep climb through pretty de...

Bagby Hot Springs is actually a set of amazing bathhouses nestled in the forest outside of Estacada. They are one of Oregon’s most poplar hot springs, and for good reason. The hike into the hot springs is easy and quite scenic. You’ll cross a bridge over Nohorn Creek and follow the Hot Springs Fork of the Collawash River up to the bathhouses. There are three sets of bathhouses at the site, eac...