May 7, 2017
With all the new trails being made here in Southern Oregon, even the maps for the various hiking parks are outdated once they are printed. So it was no surprise that we found a newer trail when hiking a new trail that wasn't even on the map at the Jacksonville Forest Park.
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| New trail......and yes, it was steep and narrow. |
When we last hiked at the Jacksonville Forest Park in March, we saw a sign for the new Siskiyou trail. The trail at that time was still being finished so we did not hike it. But now that the trail is completed and the sun was shining with temps in the 70's, we ventured out to hike at least a portion of this new trail.
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| The "Beauty" part of the Siskiyou trail..... |
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| ....and the "Beast" part of the Siskiyou trail. |
We parked at the main area just inside the park boundaries and began by hiking the Rail trail to the Ponderosa Snag trail till we came to the official start of the Siskiyou trail. It was only .5 miles to reach the trailhead. The Siskiyou trail wasted no time in qualifying for "steep" as the first .3 miles were switchbacks and uphill!
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| One of the many great views along the Siskiyou trail. |
The trail then had various uphill and downhill segments as most trail do, but overall stayed level and wound it's way through meadows & forested areas while providing momentary views of the surrounding Jacksonville Hills. We also saw lots of wildflowers during our entire hike like Paintbrush, Cat's Ear, Larkspur, Sea Blush, Fiddleneck, Balsamroot and more.
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| Balsamroot |
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| Blue Dicks |
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| Groundcone |
At about 2 miles into our hike, we came across another trail, the Siskiyou View trail which was not listed on the map. We decided to try this side trail and found that it becomes a loop trail with a spur to a viewpoint. Even though the entire length of the loop and spur trail was only a mile, we were limited on time today. So after completing the loop trail, we decided to backtrack along the Siskiyou trail to a connector trail for the Norling Creek trail.
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What? Another new trail off the new trail?
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| The end is near..... |
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| ....and the end is here! |
Once on the Norling Creek trail we headed back towards the parking area but not before hiking through the Norling Creek Wetlands area. This wetlands habitat is in the process of being restored and we saw a few geese and ducks already enjoying the benefits. The overflow from the wetlands area cascades down into the creeks below where there was bench for relaxing to the sound of the cascading water. It appears that maybe picnic tables or other benches are in the works for this area which would be great.
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One of the small waterfalls along Norling Creek
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| Geese enjoying the Norling Creek Wetlands Area |
Our hike seemed to end too quickly, but it was a beautiful day and we enjoyed venturing out on a new trail. We hope to return to the Siskiyou trail and hike it all the way to the Pipsissewa trail and Granite Falls. But that trail is not scheduled for completion till Autumn of 2017. Guess that is one hike we will have to wait on.
Trekking Together
Glenn and Carol
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