Another Beautiful Oregon Day - Sun., June 1

On my last trip to Oregon in September 2013, we had record rainfall for that month (6"). This time, we are having lovely, spring-into-summer weather. Our high temperature today was 77 degrees.

When we picked up Kimmie (our "adopted" family member) at 9 this morning, the temperature was 59 degrees. Our drive to Oregon's largest state park was uneventful, but the temperature when we started hiking was 55 degrees. Great hiking weather.

For the third time in a week, Mom and I made our way to Silver Falls State Park. Kimmie has never been, so we were thrilled to take her to see five of the ten waterfalls.

Our first hike was the easy one, Upper North Falls (65'), then the overlook of North Falls (136'). 

Kimmie and Mom - Upper North Falls

Beautiful understory.

From there we drove to Winter Falls and this time we hiked down to where we could see the entire 134' waterfall. It's quite impressive when you hike to the bottom of it.

Kimmie at Winter Falls

Mom at Winter Falls

South Falls (177') was next and we hiked behind the waterfall, down to the bridge, then continued on 0.8 mi. to Lower South Falls (93') which is my favorite of the five falls we saw today. To get to Lower South Falls, the trail drops down 185 steps and continues behind the waterfall. 

Mom and Kimmie behind South Falls

Hike along Silver Creek to Lower South Falls

Lower South Falls

Lower South Falls

Lower South Falls

Kimmie and Mom at Lower South Falls

We decided to retrace our route back up the 185 steps and 0.8 mile back to the bridge at South Falls. 

Part of the 185 stairs

Mom and Kimmie almost to the top of the stairs!

Pretty wildflowers.

Kimmie

Mom and Kimmie on bridge at South Falls

Monkeyflowers in full bloom.

Kimmie packed the lunch for today and it was time to eat. We had tofurkey sandwiches and veggie wraps with dip. Mom and I brought cut-up pineapple for dessert. 

All of us hiked well together. We were home by 2:45 p.m., tired and happy.

For dinner, I planned to meet friends Curt (former co-worker) and Lexi at 4:30 p.m. in Wilsonville. Being so tired after the hiking, I set the alarm on my cell phone and laid down in my room with the door closed to take a nap. At 4:10 p.m., my phone rang. It was Mom calling me from the kitchen to say, "Aren't you supposed to meet friends for dinner at 4:30?" I looked at the time, jumped out of bed, grabbed my purse and headed out the door, arriving at the restaurant at 4:31 p.m. Whew!

Curt, Lexi and I had a great dinner talking about their upcoming trip to Maui, future travel plans, basketball, what they've been up to and what we've been doing. The Ram restaurant had an interesting dessert I wanted to try: ice cream cupcakes. They had four different flavors; I decided on mint chocolate chip. I couldn't believe it when we got up to leave that we had been there two hours! 

I love catching up with friends. We had a very nice early evening meal. 

Travel Bug out.