The Eagle Tanner Loop - 2015/05/24

[Guy]

Opening pic

So for this week's Sundays hike since we had the Monday to recover we set our sites on a day hike around the Eagle Tanner Loop. Strangely after making this decision our usual hiking group size of anywhere between 4 & 9 shrank to just 2, Pascal & I

We arrived at the Eagle Creek parking area at 6:00am. I'd say that all the parking areas between the lower & upper lots & all along the road were 60 to 70% full with cars that had been there overnight. Lots of folks out sleeping in the woods!

That being said we were hiking one of the most used trails in the Gorge on a Holiday weekend & by the time we reached Tunnel Falls we had only seen about 8 other folks on the trail. (Early starts are wonderful things).





We reached Tunnel Falls in two hours & pressed on for the Eagle creek crossing. I've been to Tanner Butte 3 times from Eagle Creek but this would be the first time getting there by an actual trail as I'd never hiked the Eagle Tanner before.

Some lovely Jurassic Park type forest before reaching the Eagle Creek crossing.





The Eagle Creek Crossing was easy, knee deep water.





We began the slog on up to Tanner Butte, saw no other hikers but past one tent at Big Cedar Springs.





Continued on up to Thrush Pond...



We made a quick detour to tag Tanner Spring even though we didn't need any water the addition would give us the 25 miles we were looking to clock!



Took the side trail up to the Summit of Tanner, no views & a bit cold on top but we tagged it!



We arrived at the top just before 12:00 & found a sheltered spot for lunch, even with no views we ended up staying half an hour. Then it was just the quick march out & back. First along Bear Grass Alley, the Bear Grass is already blooming below 3500' & will be blooming along the Alley in 2 weeks would be my guess.



Lots of green....





We didn't really run into any more than a couple of hikers until we hit the old road.

We were back at the TH by 3:30 and in Troutdale in time for happy hour just after 4:00

I didn't lug my big camera with me on this trip but did take the GoPro

https://youtu.be/WFJqMBeXZt4

All told the hike came in at 25 miles & about 5200' of EG.

[MarkInTheDark]

Cool photos and the video is killer!

[Guy]

Cheers Mark In The Dark!

[Beer Town Bill]

I loved the video. I have done this same trip in a single day as well as a backpack, but always in a counterclockwise fashion. The Eagle Tanner Cutoff trail is in far better shape than it was ten years ago.

[Chase]

Something about that trail rainbow Google Earth map makes me think about this area in a different way now. The way the ridges spread out closer to the EC crossing part of the loop stands out more.

[Guy]

Yeah, I make those rainbow trail GE Maps in GPS Visualizer.

I believe that if you have a more modern GPS you can tie other things like heart rate to the rainbow not just altitude. It's a neat feature.