Fall brings rain and gray skies, but also brightly colored landscapes to admire. Here are the best hikes for enjoying the season — picked by Karrie Carnes, a local adventurer and the Portland ambassador for Women Who Explore:
Fall Colors in Town
Despite being surrounded by a lot of evergreens, there are impressive fall colors to be spotted even in the city:
- Big leaf maples in Forest Park: on the Maple Trail, Wildwood Trail, and Leif Ericson Trail
- Hoyt Arboretum’s maple collection.
- Portland Japanese Garden, which even has a fall colors tracker to plan your trip.
Huckleberry Hikes
In the fall, the berries are gone, but the leaves of the huckleberry plant turn a bright red. (Tip: if you do find some berries, don’t eat any growing below your knees — to avoid dog pee.)
- Umbrella Falls and Sahalie Falls up on Mount Hood.
Larch Fever
There are, in fact, deciduous conifers, which drop their needles — to go with the evergreens. There is a short window to see the larches turn a bright yellow — unusually between mid-September and mid-October. (Note: Larch Mountain has no larches.) “People get larch fever,” says Carnes.
A couple challenging hikes:
- Flag Point Lookout (There are a couple different hikes to get you to that point.)
- Five Mile Butte (accessed by Eight Mile Creek)
Vibrant Mossy Landscapes
The autumn rain brings out the bright color of the moss. If you’re admiring a waterfall, check out the plant life around it. Moss can look neon, says Carnes, “ like there's a light bulb behind it because the moss is so vibrant.”
A Hike for Every Season
Multnomah Falls is worth a visit this time of year. “ I would say just swing by Multnomah Falls, just to see how her personality changes over the seasons, because you'll have this iconic tower of a cascading waterfall that will look different every time you visit it,” says Carnes.
An Alternative to Hikes
If you don’t want to hike, here’s another way to get outside. On Oct. 19, there’s the annual Salmon Homecoming festival in Gresham, which celebrates the return of salmon to breeding grounds.
