Bridgetown Bridges: Hawthorne Bridge

This is a good choice to feature next because there seems to be a hole in my memory where this bridge should be (along with it’s Northern neighbor, the Morrison Bridge). Hopefully writing about the Hawthorne Bridge will help me cram it in my over-full brain. Clearly I’ve encountered it before because, I conveniently happened to take a photo way back when we moved here.

Flashback to 2017 photo of the Hawthorne Bridge! Wow, my hair was short.

The Hawthorne Bridge, a truss-bridge, is the oldest operating lift bridge in the country! It is quite low to the water so they have to open it more often than the other bridges to allow even small ships to pass. It is also the busiest bridge in Portland and has a busy bike lane too. However, it is farther south than I usually cross so I don’t use it very much. Hendrik walks past it on his lunch break sometimes, though.

Keeping Amy out of trouble

We were fortunate enough to be paid a visit by Amy as she began her extensive summer travels. In order to live up to expectations and give her a terrific start to her adventuring, we planned a cycling and hiking getaway Southeast of Eugene, OR. We rented an extra Brompton for her so we could all look ridiculous together pedalling along on our fold of Bromptons. We had a lovely time on the Row River Trail from the Culp Creek trailhead to the town of Cottage Grove where we stopped for lunch and brews at the top-notch patio of The Brewstation and Coast Fork Feed. Good lunch, good beers, good rhubarb pies, and good atmosphere. Coincidentally the town was also hosting a bike race and festival so there were other cyclists everywhere and we got to hear some live music. The Row River Trail is maintained by the BLM and is about 33 miles round-trip end-to-end. I was very impressed with the trail quality, scenery, and length of dedicated pedestrian/bike path.

Bromptons and Bromptoners taking a well deserved rest

The next day we attempted to hike in the Umpqua National Forest. We picked a nice 5 mile hike along a creek but we didn’t realize exactly how much it had snowed last winter and how many trees the snow had brought down. The snow was gone but the trail was littered with fallen trees. It was more of an obstacle course than a hike. The difficulty level should have been measured in fallen trees per mile instead of by elevation gain. We made it about 1-1.5 miles in 90 minutes before giving up and heading back to the car. Again, the scenery and forest were lovely. We’ll have to hike in that area again after they get a chance to do some trail maintenance.

Conquering one fallen tree. Only 2000 more to go…

Parking strip

We spent most of last weekend redoing our parking strip, with plentiful help from my parents.

We wanted something low water and low maintenance. We picked out some large stones, ripped out the grass, put down landscaping cloth, and put in what you see above. We’re extremely happy with how it turned out.

Hendrik

Camping in the Rainforest

I am used to camping in the desert so I didn’t really know what I was getting into when I reserved a campsite for Memorial Day weekend at the Stub Stewart state park in the Coast Range. The Coast Range, which is between Portland and the ocean, is a bona fide temperate rainforest. It has big trees, giant ferns, and enough rain to keep all of the plants happy. We stayed at the Brooke Creek hike-in camp, which requires a short quarter mile jaunt to get from the parking lot to the campsites so I guess it is like glamping for backpackers. The campground was fully booked for the holiday weekend but due to the weather, we had half of the campground to ourselves for the first two nights. The people at the site next to us even showed up Friday night and set up their tent but as soon as the rain started, they hightailed it for home. Hendrik said, “a drop of rain a day keeps the Californians away.” Luckily for us, our lovely little Marmot tent kept us dry and warm.

The campsite amongst the ferns

The Banks-Vernonia Bike Trail passes near the campground so we brought our folding bikes and rode through the drizzle to Vernonia for lunch. The route is gorgeous but it was all uphill on the way back to camp. Luckily we only got a little bit soggy because the the worst of the rain happened while we were inside eating burgers.

The next day we went hiking and then rode another section of the bike trail. It is built on an old rail route and uses some of the old rail bridges, the most impressive of which is the Buxton Trestle.

Hendrik at the Buxton Trestle

By Sunday night, the rain was supposed to have stopped so a lot more people showed up at the campground. After the solitude of the previous two nights, the campground felt claustrophobic, which made us grateful for the rainy weather. As if to teach them a lesson for their audacity to show up, it rained again that night!

Bridgetown Bridges: The Hawthorne Bridge