Category Archives: nature

Vancouver, USA Summer Spots (Walks #10 and #11)

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Photo: Lacamas Heritage Trail

As our Vancouver USA Summer Spots Challenge walks continue, Chules and I moved on to the Salmon Creek Greenway Trail and the Lacamas Heritage Trail.

The Salmon Creek Greenway Trail check-in was at the west end of the trail. The east end is 3 miles away at Klineline Pond, where we visited earlier in our 7th walk. I’ve been on the Salmon Creek trail many times, so it was a familiar, comfortable place to visit.

I was surprised at how low the water level was, but I guess that’s to be expected given the dry, hot weather we’ve been facing this year.

It was heating up pretty fast on the day Chules and I visited, so we didn’t walk the whole length of the trail. But we got in a good mile and did our gps check-in.

The day we went to Lacamas Lake for the Heritage Trail visit, it was actually cool and drizzly, and I was glad to have taken a warm vest along. Chules didn’t seem to care one way or the other.

I had never been on this trail before, at least not that I recall, and I was pleasantly surprised at the tall trees, lush ferns and expansive lake.

This is another candidate for a return visit in the fall to enjoy the color changes.

Eleven check-ins done, four to go!

Vancouver, USA Summer Spots (Walk #9)

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In our quest to complete the Vancouver USA Summer Spots Challenge (and thereby be entered into a drawing for which I no longer even remember what the prizes are), Chules and I made our ninth outing a trip to Washougal, Washington, which is east of Vancouver. There, the Captain William Clark Park overlooks the Columbia River.

The park’s namesake, William Clark, is half of the famed Lewis and Clark explorer duo that came to the Pacific Northwest in 1806. The park features replica dugout canoes, and while I was trying to figure out if they were supposed to be Lewis and Clark’s dugouts or those of the local Chinook tribe, I learned that the explorers never described their canoes in their journals, so the replicas would be speculation at best.

I can pretty much guarantee, though, that they didn’t have a hole at the bottom as seen in this photo:

The park is also the location of Cottonwood Beach, and I took Chules down to the water to soak his tootsies, but he was not interested in the least so we made our gps check-in and headed home.

Nine check-ins down, six to go!