Neahkahnie Mountain - 1/13/18

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justpeachy
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Location: Portland, OR
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Neahkahnie Mountain - 1/13/18

Post by justpeachy » January 18th, 2018, 8:38 am

Greg and I spent the holiday weekend at the coast and man did we hit the weather jackpot! It was gorgeous and warm all weekend. I could not believe our luck. We drove over on Saturday morning and went straight to the south trailhead for Neahkahnie Mountain where we were the sixth car at 10:30am. (Hike directions and description.)

Super cool fungus. I've never seen this one before:

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Heading up through the trees:

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This trail has a big problem with hikers cutting the switchbacks. There's a sign...

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But of course signs don't work. Here is one of the numerous spots where someone (park staff?) has put down a bunch of branches over a big eroded area that was used to cut the switchback. We saw a lot of this.

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This trail needs some work. It has become badly eroded with a lot of exposed roots:

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Man, there was a lot of lichen here!

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We scrambled the last bit up to the summit and for a few brief moments we had the place to ourselves.

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Cool clouds to the west:

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The summit benchmark is so battered that it's almost unreadable now:

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We had only been there for a couple minutes before people started showing up in droves, but we stayed on the summit for about 45 minutes enjoying the view, the sunshine, and the almost total lack of wind. On the way down we passed a whole bunch of people heading up and we were glad we got an early start. We also passed a hiker heading up who was barefoot. That did not look fun. As we drove out we counted 26 cars at the trailhead.

We had lunch at Left Coast Siesta (highly recommended), checked into our hotel, then went for a walk on the beach, where we could see good ol' Neahkahnie to the north.

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That evening we were treated to an amazing sunset:

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Video:


olderthanIusedtobe
Posts: 488
Joined: January 2nd, 2014, 10:45 am

Re: Neahkahnie Mountain - 1/13/18

Post by olderthanIusedtobe » January 18th, 2018, 2:52 pm

Looks lovely. I like Manzanita. Doesn't get as much publicity as some other coastal towns but I've always enjoyed visiting there.

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RobinB
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Location: Portland, OR

Re: Neahkahnie Mountain - 1/13/18

Post by RobinB » January 18th, 2018, 8:23 pm

Just lovely, and beautiful video! Thanks for posting.

Felipe
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Re: Neahkahnie Mountain - 1/13/18

Post by Felipe » January 26th, 2018, 2:25 pm

Superb report with awesome images! It takes time and effort to compose these reports, so many thanks. The last time I was up there was 20 years ago. My first trip up was as a teen many decades ago. Too bad the trail has suffered so many years abuse. Resources for upkeep / repair are slim, if any. Glad I have memories hiking up there so many years ago and rarely seeing another hiker — even weekends. Fast forward 40 years + tens of thousands regional population spike and it spells disaster for the easyily accessible paths. Looks like a great candidate for some volunteer restoration efforts. Love your pics!

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MarkInTheDark
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Joined: August 11th, 2008, 3:58 pm
Location: Portland, OR

Re: Neahkahnie Mountain - 1/13/18

Post by MarkInTheDark » January 26th, 2018, 3:44 pm

cool mannnn great photos

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