A whirlwind wildflower day trip through the Columbia River Gorge - Here is Oregon

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Spring wildflowers bloom at the Lyle Cherry Orchard Trail on the Washington side of the Columbia River Gorge. (Jamie Hale/Jamie Hale/The Oregonian)

Spring is here, and the flowers are calling.

For this year’s bloom, I put together a guide to what I call the “wildflower corridor” of the Columbia Gorge, a seven-mile stretch of river packed with six different places to see flowers. It’s a phenomenal area, but as I was writing, I encountered a problem: I had only been to half those places.

How could I pretend to be any kind of expert in wildflower hiking with this kind of discrepancy? The three missing spots were a nagging omission. I had to go see out and see them.

The six places that make up the wildflower corridor are Mosier Plateau, Memaloose Hills and Rowena Crest in Oregon, as well as Coyote Wall, Catherine Creek and Lyle Cherry Orchard in Washington. I had never hiked Memaloose or Coyote Wall, and had only been to Lyle Cherry Orchard in the summer, after most of the flowers are long gone. Those were the spots I needed to hit.

After waiting patiently for the long, cold winter to be over, I sketched out a trip that would take me to all three hikes over the course of a 10-hour day. It would be a whirlwind wildflower trip through the gorge.

1. LYLE CHERRY ORCHARD

The Lyle Cherry Orchard trail is one of the easternmost wildflower hikes in the Columbia Gorge, found off Washington’s State Route 14 just east of the small town of Lyle. I left Portland around 9:30 on a Thursday morning, after trying to wait out the thunderstorms rolling through the region. Lightning struck and thunder rolled as I drove across town, praying the weather wouldn’t follow me upriver.

A faint mist still fell as I pulled into the trailhead parking lot at 11, but it seemed like the storm had passed. I stuffed my rain shell into my day pack just in case, and made my way up the rocky trail.

Lyle Cherry Orchard was once an actual cherry orchard, but for the last couple of decades has been set aside as a nature preserve and hiking area, managed by Friends of the Columbia Gorge. The organization recently expanded the trail, adding two new loops, and I was eager to see those, along with any flowers in bloom.

After passing the prolific stands of poison oak and rocky rattlesnake habitat, I reached an expansive meadow atop a plateau over the river. This is where the flowers began.

Luscious purple lupines bloomed in bunches, occasionally sharing space with triplet lilies – precious white flowers that were purple at the tips. Yellow clusters of early-blooming desert parsley popped like fireworks in the brush, while tiny yellow fiddlenecks were just beginning to emerge from their green unfurling whorls.

A crack of thunder woke me up from my floral infatuation, and heavy drops of rain soon followed. I ducked into a small grove of scraggly oak trees as the drops turned into a sudden shower. I pulled on my rain shell and turned my back to the wind, crouched awkwardly beside the trail to wait it out. When the dripping trees were worse than the rain, I continued down the path, now slippery with a thin layer of mud.

As the trail climbed to the higher reaches of the cliffs, the wildflower diversity changed. Here, the beloved yellow balsamroots thrived, their big heads bouncing in the wind, intermixed with patches of lupines. The open hillside gave a breathtaking view of the Columbia River below, rivaling the vistas of nearby Dog Mountain (but with much less effort to attain).

Eventually the trail evened out, entering a stand of oaks just beginning to leaf out for the season. The forest floor was carpeted with various tiny yellow and white flowers, which glowed as the sun began to peek out through the layers of clouds.

The only sign of the old cherry orchard was a small tuft of cherry blossoms, emerging from an otherwise decrepit tree. Its trunk was hollowed out, its branches were twisted and broken, but here was a small bloom of pretty pink flowers, open to the eastern horizon over the river.

Spring wildflowers bloom at Coyote Wall, a mountain biking and hiking destination on the Washington side of the Columbia River Gorge. (Jamie Hale/Jamie Hale/The Oregonian)

2. COYOTE WALL

Wind howled as I walked the broken pavement of Old Highway 8, a road-turned-trail that marks the beginning of the hike to Coyote Wall. The long sloping hillside is popular among hikers, but probably best loved by mountain bikers, who crawl up and tear down the maze of crisscrossing trails.

I picked one of the first paths, the Old Ranch Road Trail, and slowly made my way uphill, following the snaking switchbacks carved by bikers. With virtually no cover, Coyote Wall is brutally exposed to the elements, and while I was granted reprieve from the sun (still stuck behind the clouds), the wind whipped fiercely, making waves on the meadows of tall grass and threatening to blow me away.

The meadows were full of those papery triplet lilies, while desert parsley thrived in the rockier areas. Smaller white and yellow flowers filled in the landscape here and there. It was pretty, but I knew there was something more. Peering up the slope, I spied a few patches of balsamroot in the distance. These flowers were going to make me work.

Breathing heavy at the end of Old Ranch Road, I next took the Coyote Wall Trail, which seemed to climb even more steeply uphill, the switchbacks snaking tighter as the trail ran along the edge of a sheer cliff. The wind stayed my curiosity at the cliff’s edge, and I focused instead on the goal ahead: those yellow flowers just ahead.

When I finally reached them, I turned around to take in a truly awesome view: big clusters of the yellow flowers looking east at a wide-open vista over the Columbia. Sitting down on the dusty hill to rest, I watched as a fat bumblebee danced from flower to flower. In that moment, the wind seemed to still, offering room for other sounds to come in. Insects buzzed and chirped in the grass. A bird of prey screeched in the distance. Somewhere downhill, two voices screamed with delight.

Spring wildflowers bloom over the Columbia River at Coyote Wall, a mountain biking and hiking destination on the Washington side of the Columbia River Gorge. (Jamie Hale/Jamie Hale/The Oregonian)

Spring wildflowers bloom at Memaloose State Park, a more rugged hiking area near Mosier on the Oregon side of the Columbia River Gorge. (Jamie Hale/Jamie Hale/The Oregonian)

3. MEMALOOSE HILLS

After hiking 10 miles already, I was not particularly keen on logging too many more miles. Thankfully, the flowers of Memaloose were more merciful than those at Coyote Wall.

I crossed back into Oregon on the Hood River Bridge, paying $2 in toll when I arrived. A short drive east on Interstate 84 took me to the town of Mosier, where the Historic Columbia River Highway leads visitors to a wildflower paradise.

When people ask me about wildflower hikes in this area, I typically send them not to Memaloose but to Rowena Crest, just down the road. There, you can find many miles of wandering trails that lead to cliffs over the river and the wildflower-strewn hillsides of Tom McCall Point – arguably one of the best wildflower experiences in the region.

Memaloose, by contrast, has no official trails (though it is public land) and a relatively small gravel parking area on the side of the highway, officially serving as a viewpoint overlooking the river. People hike up or downhill from there, relying on user-made trails to navigate the area (hikers are cautioned to stay on those paths and not trample over any flowers). I’ve avoided it after state officials closed access from the Memaloose Rest Area on the interstate, warning that crowds were becoming overwhelming. Still, access remains open at the viewpoint , and it seemed easy enough to dip in and out without much fuss.

From the viewpoint, I found a user trail heading downhill to the west. Flowers showed up immediately: small blooms of balsamroot and lupine, as well as patches of red paintbrush and tiny purple flowers that coated some of the hillsides. After getting some pictures and taking in a quick view of the river, I made my way back to the car.

As I packed my gear, I saw more groups of hikers arriving, taking advantage of the late spring sunset for an evening hike up higher in the hills. Tempting as it was to follow in their footsteps, it was already 5:30 and time to drive home.

Within a few minutes, I had left the wildflower corridor behind and found myself back among the cliffs and waterfalls in the heart of the gorge. Those natural attractions are eternal (at least as long as the rocks remain and the water still flows), but these flowers are ephemeral – a celebration of fleeting beauty and seasonal rejuvenation. How lucky are we to have so many places to appreciate them?

— Jamie Hale

503-294-4077; jhale@oregonian.com; @HaleJamesB

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A whirlwind wildflower day trip through the Columbia River Gorge - Here is Oregon

1. LYLE CHERRY ORCHARD

2. COYOTE WALL

3. MEMALOOSE HILLS

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