Last week we decided to go on a small hike to a waterfall that I’d seen online while Googling hiking spots near Portland. I wasn’t sure if Rotchana would be up for it since hiking really isn’t her thing, but she thought it would be fun and she wanted to see the waterfall so off we went.
Wahclella Falls was our destination, which is about another 10 minutes east of the more famous Multnomah Falls in the Columbia River Gorge area east of Portland. We left late in the morning to avoid the traffic in and around Portland and arrived at the trailhead at 11:00am.
It was a nice day in the sense that it wasn’t raining and there wasn’t any wind, but it was in the low 40’s so not quite perfect. There were only a handful of cars in the lot when we arrived so we knew it wouldn’t be all that crowded.
The trail is a roughly 2 mile loop taking you to the Wahclella Falls at the tip of the loop. The first half of the hike is on a service road that parallels Tanner Creek. The trail beyond that isn’t steep and is wide enough where Victoria and I could walk together without having to worry about her slipping off the trail.
It took us about 2 hours to hike the entire trail and get back to the car while spending time at the falls. Victoria was a trooper and walked probably 90% of the time. Rotchana did well, too and didn’t complain about the distance. She enjoyed taking a bunch of selfies at the falls to share with her friends back in Thailand.
I’ll be looking for more hikes that we can all enjoy. We might even come back and redo this hike so I can get better photos of the falls. I was busy watching Victoria and didn’t pay attention to how much mist had gotten on my lenses that most of the shots weren’t all that great. Photos aside, we had a great time.
