It’s raining like crazy now, but when we got up this morning the sun was shining and it was nice, so we headed to Munson Falls located on the outskirts of Tillamook. This is the highest falls in the Oregon Coastal area, over 266 feet high. It was a short hike off the road south of town. They are quite pretty, although not a huge volume of water. The trail there really gave us the rain forest effect. It made you think of Sherwood Forest and Robin Hood. The trees had lichen growing all over them giving them a furry appearance. Some pictures follow.
We then travelled east to the Tillamook Forest Center, an interesting center for learning how Oregon is managing the Tillamook State Forest. They had major forest fires here in 1933, 1946, and 1951 that devastated much of the forest in the Tillamook area. It told how they lumbered out the burned snags and replanted with Douglas Firs. Today little remains of that devastation. Their management of the situation set the standard for how forests are restored and managed. The center had a bunch of trails and a fire lookout station replica. These fire lookouts were managed 24 hours a day usually by 2 people on shifts. They are stuck in these things for several days until rotated out. A lonely job to be sure.
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