Back in 2007 I shared photos of how the Canyon Creek Meadows trail looked four years after the 2003 B and B Complex fire roared through this part of the Jefferson Wilderness in central Oregon.
Here's an update, seven years later.
Yeah, just a little ways from the trailhead we're told this is wilderness. As in wild. As in Thoreau's famous saying, "In Wildness is the preservation of the world." It sure helps us feel better about the world to be away-from-it-all for a while.
Early on in the hike it is evident that regrowth is happening 11 years after the fire. It just will take quite a while longer until trees create the shade that used to mark most of the trail.
We hiked the loop trail in the counter-clockwise direction (from the parking lot) coming and going. The fire opened up views of Mt. Jefferson to the north.
Previously we'd never made the side .7 mile trip to Wasco Lake. This time we did. The trail to the lake starts off by crossing Canyon Creek via some large rocks. Our dog, ZuZu, made a lay down stop in the cool water (temperature was in the mid 80's during our hike).
The vegetation ecosystem not surprisingly has changed after the fire. There wouldn't have been wildflowers here before.
Like I said in my previous post, there's a yin-yang beauty to the post-fire scenery. Death and life. Light and dark.
Reaching Wasco Lake, ZuZu did some stick retrieving. We ate our sandwiches in a few bits of shade that remain along the mostly burned-out shoreline.
Returning to the Canyon Creek Meadows trail, before too long we encountered the first signs of a...meadow! Beautiful.
Don't stop at the lower meadows though. If you have the energy and the time, keep going toward Three Fingered Jack. You'll feel like a character in The Lord of the Rings approaching Mordor. (I think I've got the name right; been a long time since I read the trilogy.) Here's our faithful hobbit dog on the trail.
The sun was almost directly over Three Fingered Jack when we arrived at the upper meadow via a trail that took us up the side of a slope. Walking up Canyon Creek to the upper meadow is easier, but we missed an easy-to-miss side trail on the way up. Snow! In August!
Here I am in my much-beloved Salem Summit t-shirt (great downtown outdoor store) before descending into the upper meadow. Another snow field springs out of the left side of my head.
More yin and yang in the upper meadow. Wildflowers and snow.
Heading back to the Canyon Creek Trail via a path that goes along the creek, ZuZu decided to -- no big surprise -- lie down in the creek. She did this many times during our hike.
One last look back at Three Fingered Jack before we departed the upper meadow.
And one last photo of the encouraging regrowth. Nature knows what it is doing. Forest fires are natural. So is the forest returning after a fire.
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