Beekman Loop Trail

At one of our church caring groups that I attend, I was talking to Mal and he told me about a nature trail he and his wife hike after church every week.

Since we here in the Rogue Valley have had unusually cooler weather even into July this year I thought it would be a great short hike in the low areas around our valley. The trail is a fairly easy 1 ml loop. There is some climbing in elevation also.

 

 

Beekman Loop Trail is located behind the historic Beekman house on 352 East California Street in Jacksonville. There is a whole system of trails in and around Jacksonville and most will give a hiker some great views of Jacksonville and the surrounding area.

 

 

Here is a site that offers an online interactive map for all the trails in and around Jacksonville: Jacksonville Woodlands Association

What I didn’t realize is the area also is home to Beekman Native Plant Arboretum. It was really too late in the year to see anything blooming but the Arboretum has 175+ native plants, so expect another article next spring! There is a nice brochure at the trail head that you could pick-up before taking the hike.

Wikipedia has an article on the Beekman Native Plant Arboretum just click HERE to read it.

 

 

The Mail Tribune in August 2007 had a good article about Jacksonville’s trail system called “Off the Tourist Trail” if you want to read that click HERE.

In the natural I love paths, roads, doors, windows and walls with gates. They remind me of the paths we take in life and the different doors we have to choose from as we grow up and as we get older.

God uses the words path and road quite often in the scriptures:

Ps 119:105 Your word is a lamp to my feet, and a light to my path. NKJV

Rev 3:20 Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with him, and he with Me. NIV

 

 

What are some of the paths you have taken? Where did they lead you?

Rainey Falls Trail on the Rogue River

Hike on June 30 2011

 

The weather in our Valley has been so unpredictable this year!


A bit of personal information: I’m a hospice nurse and work an unusual schedule by working a week on then a week off and I don’t work weekends. Neil (my husband) works Friday through Sundays.

So when we want to go for hikes we have to plan around our 2 schedules. If you add the weather into the equation and the fact that I’m a “fair weather” hiker, planning any outdoor activity for us is “iffy” at best.

Last Thursday met all our conditions and was a perfect day for hiking along the Rogue River to Rainey Falls.

Too get to Rainey Falls you have to drive through Merlin and past Hellgate Canyon. If you have ever taken one of the jet boat rides from Grants Pass you have probably been down there.

 

Eventually you get to an area that is unmarked except for cars parked along the road, a bridge that crosses over the Rogue and a boat dock for rafters. There are 2 trails one on each side of the Rogue. We always take the trail on the south side (left) of the river because it’s the cooler side.

The trail is 2 miles down to Rainey Falls and it took is about 3 ½ hrs round trip. That includes a slow pace (for me), stops along the way and a longer sit down at Rainey Falls to watch the rafts try to get around the main fall area.

Traffic on the river was steady but not over crowded. On the trail there were even less folks hiking, so it made for a quite a nice nature day.




I wish there was some way to describe the scent of the river, trees, bushes, plants and mosses so that you could experience this hike as I show you the pictures but that is impossible. For me the fragrances of nature on the hikes are as important to me as seeing and hearing everything.

As we walked along the trail all of a sudden this really sweet fragrance was so strong that I stop immediately to look around to find where it came from.




I don’t know what kind of plant this is. It has flowers like honeysuckle, but they are much larger. In another place we came across a myrtle tree, the leaves smell like bay leafs only stronger.

The following 2 videos are of Rainey Falls. The second one has a raft going through.

For those of you that are unable to hike this trail I hope this has given you a little taste of heaven on earth.

Blessings to each of you,
Shari

EAGLE POINT NATIONAL CEMETERY

Today Mom and I took a ride out to where my father’s ashes are buried. This is Memorial Day Weekend and for many it is the first long weekend of the year for camping, boating, and family get-together's.

Although here in the Rogue Valley it is a bit wet and chilly today there are many things going on around the Valley like Boatnik in Grants Pass (CLICK HERE to find out what that is about if you aren’t from this area.) If you like to hang-glide the RVHPA are flying the skies in the Applegate. There are lots of people BBQing, but probably under their patios. Mom and I did see a few hardy folks up at Willow Lake camping-out in travel trailers.

For many people Memorial Day (it used to be called Decoration Day) is a day to remember those who have gone-on before us.

According to Wikipedia:

Memorial Day “began as a ritual of remembrance and reconciliation after the Civil War, by the early 20th century, Memorial Day was an occasion for more general expressions of memory, as ordinary people visited the graves of their deceased relatives, whether they had served in the military or not.”

As a nation, we observe this holiday as a commemoration to the United States Service Men and Women who died while in the military service. On television we often see pictures and video’s of Arlington National Cemetery on this weekend, but our own local national cemetery (better known as the VA Cemetery) also places flags on every grave and flies many large flags around the cemetery.

 

This article is dedicated to my father Bill Keal.

We know he isn’t under that stone because he is fishing with Jesus in heaven but Mom and I like to come out here occasionally anyway.

GRANARY TREES

Last October 2010, my friend Louise and I took a trip to the coast, Bandon to Florence. I don’t like going on I-5 if I can avoid it. So we went up Tablerock Rd angling toward Shady Cove.

Louise suggested we stop in at TouVelle Park because she wanted to show me something. We drove all the way through the parking lot to the end. Where there was a tall Pine Tree, so I thought to myself “Big Deal!” after all we live in Oregon.

We got out of the car and she had me get up closer to the tree where I could get a good look at the bark. To my amazement, there were 100’s of holes with acorns stuck in many of them. I did mention that the tree was a Pine right?

Louise had no idea why there were acorns in the tree and there was no one about that I could ask. The best I could do was take a picture of this unusual site:

 

Fast forward 6 months. May 1^st on a Sunday Mom and I were out for a ride after church at New Song. I thought it would be interesting to take a photo of the whole tree in TouVelle Park. So we drove past the little building at the beginning of the park, found our way back to where that tree was in October. Before I could get out of my car, a park ranger is standing in front of me writing down my license plate number (I didn’t pay as I came into the park. Oops!)

I was able to talk him out of giving me a ticket (nice young man), get my picture of the tree and ask him a bunch of questions.

 

 

The tree you see in the picture is called a “Granary Tree”, because the Acorn Woodpeckers in the area (after drilling holes in it) use the tree to stash acorns which they then eat all winter for food. The ranger said he only knew of one other tree like this in all of Jackson County. That tree is over near the Rogue River close to the now torn down Gold Rey Dam.

You can read more about this in Wikipedia, I didn’t get a picture of the Acorn Woodpecker but I certainly know what it looks like now.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acorn_Woodpecker

Matt 6:25 "Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? 26 Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns (well maybe in a tree), and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? 27 Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?” NIV

Mill Creek Falls Trail

Wednesday Neil (my husband) and I went for a hike (walk) on Mill Creek Falls Trail. We were having such a nice run of sunny weather we knew that the spring run off pouring down the falls would be spectacular. There are 2 sets of falls, Mill Creek and Barr Creek, that pour into the Rogue River just above Lost Creek Reservoir.

It had been been a couple of years since we had been up there and we missed the parking lot and had to circle around back to it. It’s not that hard to find if you are paying attention.LOL

When we get down to the “T” we went right which leads to the 2 sets of falls. There weren’t very many people out on the trail this day. The first falls are the Mill Creek Falls they drop 173 feet to the Rogue River below.

 

I did take this video, we’ll see if I can get it to show up here:

 

Wow I think I got it on here!

We then walked on down to Barr Falls it is at the end of the trail and you have to climb up some rocks to get a good look at it but it is worth it. The only issue was the falls were in the shade but I was still able to get some good shots.

In the first picture you can barely see it but the falls start almost at the tops of the tree line.

From there we went back to the “T” and walked down the left hand trail that leads to the Avenue of the Giant Boulders. This is a warning sign about the this area of the Rogue River being a Class 5 river (1 mile in length) for people who Kayak. Personally I think anyone kayaking here would have to be a little “crazy”.

Watching Neil climb around in those rocks makes me nervous.

 

Well after that excitement I was read to head back to the Trail Head. On the way back home we stopped at Casey Park where we saw Oregon Grape, the state flower, it was in bloom.

All in all a wonderful day!