Oneonta Gorge, Before the Fire

Oneonta Gorge
Columbia River Gorge, Oregon
July 29, 2015 | 7:35am

Every hike has a beginning. This one began with a tunnel.

On a quiet July morning during a week off from work, I packed a swimsuit, a shirt, and sandals and drove east along the Historic Columbia River Highway. My destination was Oneonta Gorge, one of Oregon’s most unusual hikes.

Unlike most trails, this one offered no dry path to follow.

The creek was the route.

After descending into the gorge, I was greeted almost immediately by one of its defining features: a massive pile of logs spanning the narrow canyon.

There was no marked route over them. Everyone found their own way, climbing across trunks carried into the gorge by years of winter floods. It was less an obstacle than an introduction. From the very beginning, Oneonta Gorge made it clear that this would be a different kind of hike.

That morning, I had the entire gorge to myself.

The only sounds were flowing water echoing between the basalt walls and the occasional movement of leaves high above.

Beyond the logjam, the gorge narrowed.

The water, cool even in July, became deeper with every bend. What began as a shallow creek eventually rose to my waist and, in places, nearly to my chest. Getting wet was never an inconvenience—it was simply part of the experience.

Towering basalt walls blocked much of the sunlight, allowing mosses and ferns to thrive on nearly every surface. Walking through the gorge felt less like following a trail than moving through a landscape shaped entirely by water.

With each turn, the canyon became quieter and more enclosed until Lower Oneonta Falls appeared in the distance, framed by dark volcanic walls.

Reaching Lower Oneonta Falls felt less like arriving at a destination than completing the journey the gorge had asked of me.

The waterfall itself was beautiful, but what stayed with me was everything required to reach it: the cold water, the climb over the logjam, the towering canyon walls, and the rare experience of moving through a landscape with no constructed trail at all.

The Return Hike

The return followed the same path in reverse.

I climbed back over the logjam, walked once more through the cold creek, and eventually emerged from the gorge, leaving behind what had simply been a memorable summer hike.

Two years later, the Eagle Creek Fire burned through much of the Columbia River Gorge. Although the fire itself did not erase Oneonta Gorge, the years that followed brought erosion, unstable slopes, and hazardous logjams. The gorge remains closed, and the hike I experienced can no longer be undertaken in the same way.

Looking back, these photographs document more than a summer hike. They preserve an Oregon landscape as it was experienced before that chapter came to an end.

Sometimes history begins with an ordinary morning, a creek instead of a trail, and only years later reveals itself as something worth preserving.

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Editor’s Note
The photographs accompanying this essay were taken on July 29, 2015. Following the 2017 Eagle Creek Fire, Oneonta Gorge sustained significant post-fire damage and remains permanently closed because of ongoing hazards, including erosion, unstable slopes, and dangerous logjams.