Oregon Hikers

Hiked up the river trail (mostly) to the fourth camping area, about 10.5 miles in. This trip really left me sore, and for only a 21 mile RT. I'm in the worst shape in a long time and have my work cut out. It rained most of Saturday night, but didn't start until after I got in the tent and stopped an hour or so before sunrise, so that was perfect. And sun slowly came out to full sunshine by midmorning.

Anyway, my reward for my early season training hike was seeing two sizable herds of goats up on the hillside on the way back. It would have been easy to miss them up there. The goat photo is pretty lousy, but phone cameras were not designed for wildlife!

cool

I saw three herds on my side a couple years ago. They crossed the trail right in front of me. I was a bit scared, except they just continued on their way, seemed to be avoiding me.

Mountain goats?? Not bighorn sheep?

adamschneider wrote: ↑

March 25th, 2019, 1:33 pm

Mountain goats?? Not bighorn sheep?

To be honest, all I could think was that they looked like caribou! But if they do not have their big rounded horns this time of year, I guess they could be bighorns. None of my pics is any better than the one posted.

yeah, bighorn sheep, at least that's what I've seen before, never goats

drm wrote: ↑

March 25th, 2019, 2:00 pm

To be honest, all I could think was that they looked like caribou! But if they do not have their big rounded horns this time of year, I guess they could be bighorns. None of my pics is any better than the one posted.

OK, sounds like it was definitely sheep then. They're tan with white butts.

Title and labels corrected - thanks.

My partner and I did an in-and-out to Gordon Ridge Rapids on 3/30 (just over 11 miles R/T)... in on the railbed and back out on the river trail.

We also saw the sheep way up on the ridge, only their silhouettes.

As well as a trio of river otters about a mile or so south of the trailhead.

It's generally much greener than this time last year, thanks to the burn. I plan to be back in a couple weeks for an overnight.

Great sighting drm! The ewes(females) have much smaller/straighter horns than the rams. Bighorn don't shed their horns either, so it was probably a group of females.