The Importance of Whale Poop

A study finds that whale poop plays a major role in the health of the ocean, here.

No, there will not be a cocktail recipe for this one.

Springwater Trail Parts 2 and 3

You can enter Oaks Bottom from the north or the south. I’ve always avoided the main entrance to the north because I associate it with death. When I was in college, a kid I knew disappeared, and I remember them searching Oaks Bottom for him (they later found his body in the river). Years later, someone else I knew drowned there. But I’ve been walking Jackie along the bluff above Oaks Bottom and down through the southern part for many years as well. There are lots of birds there, including blue herons, osprey, and at certain times of the year, a pair of bald eagles.

For the sake of the project, I finally parked at the main entrance and walked down trail I’d been avoiding. It’s a perfectly nice, lightly wooded area, with a paved trail that links up with the Springwater trail.

I continued south, past the gigantic mausoleum, until I got to Southeast Spokane Street, and then I went back. There’s a mural on the mausoleum wall that faces the marsh, with native birds painted much, much larger than life. I wrote an article about it once, and interviewed the head muralist. Well, it turns out that he is also dead — he died in a snowmobiling accident this spring.

A few days later I parked near Spokane and took the next segment of the trail, including the part that hasn’t been built yet. You walk on surface streets for about half a mile, heading west away from the Willamette, until you get back to the trail. As you can see in the photo, it’s not quite as fancy as the main entrance from Day One.

We walked through Sellwood and crossed three bridges: one over Johnson Creek, one over the highway, and one over some railroad tracks. If you were leading a group hike, you could work in a little commentary on the history of transportation here.

From here on out, Johnson Creek will be a regular presence. It’s the one remaining of a huge number of creeks that used to run through the city of Portland (or where the city was to be.) For some reason Johnson Creek was never paved over — one of those examples where neglect is beneficial for the environment in the long term. Johnson Creek runs through some of the sketchier parts of Portland. Along with its obscene name, the creek brings to mind trailer homes, abandoned cars, dumped tires, and blackberry brambles.

The Springwater Trail, Phase 1

The goal: hike the Springwater Trail.

That’s right, 21 miles of un-punishing trails and non-rugged terrain in a climate where temperatures can gradually plunge to below 50 degrees. Each non-grueling stage of the journey will last from two to five unexcruciating miles.

One thing about old railroad beds — they’ve been graded to a perfect flatness. Work on the Springwater Trail in 1996 and it is mostly, but not entirely, completed. It begins where the Eastbank Esplanade ends and continues east all the way to Boring, following a route that was the route of a passenger train from 1903 to 1958.

During the first stage of the expedition, I discovered that the bike- and foot-path closest to my house, and which I’d never been on before, is really cool. You pass by wooded areas, great views of the river, weird industrial scenes, and picturesque homeless camps. Since I don’t have someone dropping me off and picking me up, I actually have to hike the whole trail twice over. On the first day, I got to Milepost 2.5 and then returned.

An osprey's nest

as seen from the Springwater Trail

A side channel of the Willamette River

as seen from the Springwater Trail

Down with Dudley

Republican candidate for Oregon governor Chris Dudley is an one-man environmental disaster. His biggest donor, in fact, is a timber company. And his economic policies are likely to cause serious problems for the enforcement of basic environmental rules. When the Oregonian did a piece on the two candidates’ views on the environment, Dudley blew off the reporter. Oh, yeh, and he’s not convinced that global warming is caused by humans. I couldn’t bring myself to make a cocktail for him, so instead, I made one in honor of his opponent, Oregon’s dashing former governor, John Kitzhaber (endorsed by the Sierra Club. The candidate, I mean, not the drink.)

Kitz cocktail:

1 shot bourbon

1 teaspoon maple syrup

splash of pepper vodka

Combine ingredients in a shaker without ice and stir. Add ice and shake. Strain into your most attractive cocktail glass. This is a close race, but the more you drink, the more votes Kitzhaber will get.

Drink your beer from a bottle

Aluminum production is not cool, especially when something goes wrong, as it just did in Hungary.