Pacifica Gardens & Waters Creek



Lake at Pacifica Gardens



Our daughter Maggie is visiting us this week from Wyoming (it's Spring Break there and Maggie is a teacher), so what better way to celebrate but to take a vacation day from work and hike!  Doesn't everyone hike during Spring Break?



View of Pacifica Gardens from one of the trails

We recently read an article about Pacifica Gardens located in Williams (between Grants Pass & Ruch) and decided to drive out there and hike a couple of their trails.  Despite the forecast for chances of rain, the weather stayed dry and we even had sunshine at times.  Pacifica Gardens is a work in progress and we found that some of the trails were not well marked.  At one point we walked through a meadow (not sure if it was private property) with horses looking at us from the other side of the fence wondering what we were doing. We only hiked for about an hour on three different short trails, but we did manage to see some Spring flowers.  I have included those pictures at the bottom of this blog for your viewing. If you know the name of the red flower, leave us a comment.

The area at Pacifica is beautiful and includes a lake and retreat area. Over 100 species of birds have been identified there  - we saw a few Canadian Geese, a woodpecker (not sure which species), a Flicker, and a Purple Martin in our short visit.

Waters Creek

Since the Pacifica Gardens hikes were short, we then drove to Waters Creek which is south of Grants Pass. We have hiked this trail a couple of times in the past and always enjoy the sound of Waters Creek along the trail and viewing the lush green undergrowth throughout the main trail.

An omen of things to come!

Today there was one added feature throughout our hike - fallen trees on the trail!  I lost track of how many trees were down and how many we went over vs how many we went under.  Our dog Katie, who joined us today, didn't understand what all the fuss was about -- she just went under each tree - no problem!
 

Our amazing (and 4-armed) daughter Maggie!

We spent about an hour-and-a-half hiking the longer 3-mile outside loop trail and when combined with our earlier hikes at Pacifica Gardens, made for a great day of hiking.  Of course after all that hiking you need to eat and replenish those burned calories, so we stopped at Jasper's in Medford and picked up Burger Baskets with fries and drinks.......ahhhh yes, I love Spring Break!

Trekking Together
Glenn and Carol