7/15/20
- Start point– Soda Springs Trailhead
- End point – Wright Creek Trailhead
- Distance hiked ~ 22.3 miles
SEGMENTS:
- Jessie Wright Segment (4.1 miles)
- Masters Segment (4 miles)
- Calf Segment (3.7 miles)
- Panther Segment (5 miles)
- Mott Segment (5.5 miles)
My campsite right next to the Soda Springs dam was much warmer than the prior evening. Perhaps it was the fact that I was camping dozens of feet higher than the water. Or that I wasn’t deep in a rock canyon again. But, it really was a pleasant night. I could still hear the rushing of the water, but wasn’t overly worried that animals would want to use my site as access to the river. And the venom from my bee stings seems to have settled down too. I got a decent night’s sleep, and was up around 6 am feeling great.
Today’s first challenge, however, was going to be figuring out the distance of the Jessie Wright Segment. But before I get there, a quick word on Jessie Wright. If you aren’t from this part of Oregon, you’ve probably never heard about this badass woman. And you’re probably wondering why a segment of the NUT was named after her.
Back in the early 20th century, Jessie Louetta Hatfield Wright (1898-1990) and her husband Perry were homesteaders at Illahee Flats along the North Umpqua River. Jessie was one of seven children and got married at the young age 16. Then she and her husband began using horses and mules to pack in supplies for the U.S. Forest Service (USFS) and hunters in the area. A spirited woman who held her own in the backcountry, Jessie even went on to write the book, How High the Bounty, about her homesteading adventures. One of the best photos of her is entitled Lady Hunter. Clearly she didn’t shy away from anything!
How long is it??
So while I was intrigued by the fantastic life of Jessie Wright, I still had a major mystery to solve on this upcoming segment of the trail. There were two signs at the Soda Springs trailhead. One was the giant kiosk right next to where I’d gathered water from the water pipeline last night. It looked just identical to the information in the BLM brochure, but with one minor difference… The kiosk said this upcoming segment was 5.1 miles long. That was weird. The brochure said it was 4.1 miles long.
A second, smaller wooden sign posted at the trailhead (not 50 feet from the kiosk) and it said the Masters trailhead was only 4 miles away. One mile is a pretty big variance given that the signs were literally right next to each other. So I wondered, did the kiosk just have a typo on it?? Or had the USFS recently re-routed the trail and added an additional mile?
In grand scheme of things, this small detail didn’t really make a heap of difference. I was going to hike the entire thing whether it was 4.1 miles of 5.1 miles. But, details like these tend to get under my skin and niggle at the back of my brain. I want to know what to expect.
The initial mile of the Jessie Wright segment was along a forest service road that followed the river. So I turned the problem over and over in my head while and mindlessly walked the easy path, noticing lots more awesome campsites along the way. Then I came to a gate blocking the trail, and there was a new sign with mileages on it. Maybe this sign would resolved the dispute. I looked closely and the sign indicated that I still had 3 more miles to go. Ok – I guess the segment really is 4.1 miles long. it was just a typo on the kiosk!
Just beyond the gate, the trail climbed dramatically, and I felt like I was right back on the Umpqua Hot Springs trail, but without the handrail to assist me as trucked upward. At the top of the steep hill, the Boulder Creek Trail (#1552) broke off to my right and continued up to the top of the next ridge. And at that trail junction there was another sign pointing straight ahead to the Masters Trailhead. This sign said I still had 4 miles to go!
Oh c’mon guys! What the heck are you doing here? Why can’t you get it right? This isn’t something the USFS has to guess about. It’s a subjective fact. The segment is either 4.1 miles long or 5 .1 miles. How hard is this little detail??
At this point in my mind, I started to entertain myself with a fictitious story about two USFS rangers (let’s call them Jeff and Chad) sitting in the local office having a bitter debate over this segment of trail. Jeff is an old-school ranger with a big bushy mustache and he’s certain this segment is 4.1 miles long – just like the USGS maps tell him. But Chad is the new young buck in the office. He rode his mountain bike out on this segment over the weekend, and his high-tech bike computer told him it’s really a mile longer. He tried to convince Jeff that he’s right, but Jeff is not hearing it. So each time a new sign needs to be fabricated to replace an old one, Chad swoops in and volunteers to make it. Then he surreptitiously changes the mileage data to 5.1 miles behind Jeff’s back.
Ok. That story is probably a bit more dramatic than the real reason behind the conflicting signs. But your mind wanders when you’re out hiking a long-distance trail all by yourself with no one else to bounce these thoughts off.
Spawning
Once I finally finished with the Jessie Wright segment (which was 4.28 miles long according to my GPS), I popped out of the woods near the Umpqua Highway. It was still early in the morning, and luckily, there wasn’t a lot of traffic on the road. I was grateful for the quiet because I now needed to walk about 300 meters along this two-lane highway. Plus, I had to get and over Marsters Bridge on a slender 3-foot road shoulder before I’d get to the trailhead on the opposite side of the road.
This was one of the handful of places on this trail that really was a bit sketchy. A logging truck speeding down the highway would have made that short, narrow road walk absolutely nerve wrecking since there was nowhere to bail out on the bridge.
Once I was over to the other side of the highway and at the trailhead though, I was treated to one of the more interesting sights of the morning — the Weeping Rocks spawning beds. According to the signs along the river, this is one of the places where spring chinook salmon begin and end their life.
Spring chinook salmon are born in the spawning beds and, after a year in the Umpqua River, the smolts (young fish) migrate out into the Pacific Ocean where they spend most of their adult lives. After 2-5 years, the adults fish return to the river and swim upstream to near where they were hatched. The female fish dig a shallow hole (called a redd) in the gravel and then lay as many as 5,000 eggs! Then after spawning, both the male and female salmon die. What’s even more interesting is how that massive number of eggs will really only turn into 50 smolts, and about 4 ocean adults!
When I was a young kid living in Roseburg, Oregon, my parents used to love to take my sisters and I to the fish ladder near Winchester Dam downriver from here. We’d watch as chinook (and coho) salmon swam and jumped their way up the fish ladder. On average, 3,000 to 9,000 wild spring chinook make the journey up that ladder annually on their way to places like this along the North Umpqua. So, in stopping an viewing the Weeping Rocks spawning beds, it was like adding another chapter to that childhood story for me.
Berries & Bones
With the Jessie Wright Segment and Weeping Rocks behind me, it was time to make some morning miles. Next up was the 4-mile Marsters Segment of the NUT. The beginning of this segment brought quite a bit more foliage overgrowing the trail. It wasn’t nearly as difficult as climbing over and under trees like yesterday morning on the Dread & Terror Segment. Yet, I still wanted to watch my step. I was now in poison oak territory and I was wearing shorts!
If I had to give one piece of advice to future NUT thru-hikers, I might recommend long pants – or at least wearing some knee-high gaiters to avoid the poison oak here. I’d opted to only wear my Patagonia shorts and a pair of ankle-high Dirty Girl gaiters. So, there was plenty of exposed skin at risk as I made my way down the trail and through the foliage.
Of course, poison oak wasn’t the only flora on the menu this morning. There were plenty of flowers in bloom, and also thickets of blackberries!! My favorite Oregon hiking perk is the wild blackberries growing along the trail. It was still a touch early in the season, so only about 50% of the berries were ready to pluck from the vine. But there was still more than enough along the trail to augment my breakfast. I repeatedly stopped all morning long to pick handfuls of these sweet, ripe bundles of goodness.
In addition to the threat of poison ivy and the lure of blackberries, I came across one more bizarre sight on the Marsters Segment. As I turned rounded a corner of the trail, I could see a bunch of feathers off to the left side of the trail. Upon closer inspection, it appeared to be some sort of bird or pheasant carcass. The skeleton was mostly intact (minus the head) and the bones had been picked clean. But, the weird part was that most of the feathers still clung to the end of the wings. And whatever predator or scavenger ate this bird did so with a level of delicacy that all the bones were still unbroken. It was just one of those weird sights you just have a hard time turning a way from.
The Apple Fire
I finished the Marsters Segment around mid-morning and made it to the Calf Trailhead next. The upcoming segment of trail was one I’d been gnashing my teeth over for the past few days. Back in September 1987, lightning struck some trees in this segment igniting a massive wildfire. A severe drought, 100 degree temperatures, and the inaccessible terrain made it is very difficult to extinguish the fire, so much of the area was just left to burn.
Fast forward to 2002, and another major fire (this one man-made) set 17,000 acres of the forest alight. This subsequent fire, often referred to as the Apple Fire (named after nearby Apple Creek) left thousands of fallen trees and massive land slides in its wake. Luckily the North Umpqua River stopped the fire from spreading further north and contained the edge of it at the river. Yet, the fire also destroyed the segment of the NUT that ran through this next 3.7 miles.
My trail brochure still had a warning in bright red letters indicating this trail segment was closed to all users until further notice because of the unsafe conditions from the fire. And so, I was mentally prepared to do a 3.7-mile road walk along the Umpqua Highway (aka Highway 138) – if needed – to get around it safely.
Of course, I was hopeful that the trail had since been repaired, and the BLM brochure simply hadn’t been updated to reflect the re-opening. After all, the Apple Fire occurred nearly 18 years ago. Surely that was long enough to rebuild that stretch of trail. But, wildfires are a constant battle on the West Coast, given the high number of drought years and effects of climate change. Perhaps the 2002 Apple Fire wasn’t the most recent blaze to impact the area.
So, I decided to wait and let the trailhead kiosks made the decision for me. If there were any signs indicating a fire closure, or that this part of the trail was still impacted from the fire, I’d endure the undesirable road walk. But, in the absence of any such signs, I’d go ahead and press my luck and stay on the trail instead.
When I reached the Calf Trailhead, I scoured all the signs to see if there were any fire closure notices. I knew the USFS was posting regular notices because I’d seen the one yesterday telling me that Medicine Creek Bridge was out. Yet, I didn’t see anything at the trailhead indicating the trail was still closed. So I set out down the path to see what it held.
After all, I’d probably know pretty quick if it was unsafe. I wasn’t going to take any risks with a washed out trail or landslide area, that’s for sure! The slopes along the river are simply too steep to expect a safe alternative around that. If the trail wasn’t passable, I’d rather take my chances with the logging trucks instead.
As it turns out, the trail as in exemplary condition. It was immediately apparent that the USFS and volunteers spent loads of time rebuilding it. There was still evidence of gabion (wire cages filled with rocks) that had been put in to create new tread on the steep slopes of the hillsides. And the trail was nice and wide throughout this segment. I guess, I lucked out! The trail was open and in remarkably good condition under the circumstances.
HIKERTRASH
I finished up the Calf Segment in quick order and when I got to the Panther Trailhead decided this was probably a good time take an extended lunch break and rest my feet. There was even a nice pit toilet near the trailhead. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much of a place to sit and eat though. No picnic table. Not even a bench to sit on.
One the far side of the road, there was a small paved parking area just big enough for one car. But a middle-aged man already had his motorcycle parked over there and he was standing behind it eating his lunch and talking to someone on his bluetooth. Just beyond him, the Panther Segment of trail descended into thick underbrush and narrow trail. So that was an equally poor option for a lunch spot.
The bit of trail I’d just come from didn’t have any better options to rest on either. There was no flat space anywhere on the past 1/2 mile I’d just hiked. There was a small unpaved car turnaround spot just up the road, but it had a giant pile of dirt and gravel stacked at one end of it. Yet maybe that would do. It was flat and mostly shaded. Plus how much space did I really need? And so, I whipped out my tent and set it up for an relaxing hour of rest right beside the road.
As the motorcycle guy eyeballed me, I felt like complete hikertrash erecting my tent next to a giant gravel pit on the edge of the road. But who cared? It wasn’t like I was staying here for the night. And I wasn’t bothering a soul! So I got inside my tent, kicked off my shoes, and lay back on my to pack to rest and eat my lunch.
PANTHER SEGMENT
During the hour I spent relaxing in my tent, the sun had shifted, and it was now directly overhead. There was very little shade left to be had anymore and it was getting hot. And so, that was my sign to pack up and get moving. Lunchtime was over! After a quick stop at the pit toilet, I was ready to hit the trail again. I’d hiked 12 miles before lunch and was going to try to push to get the next two segments complete before the end of the day. The Panther Segment was another 5 miles, and the Mott Segment was 5.5 more miles after that. Given the relative ease of the trail today, it seemed completely feasible.
The Panther Segment was covered with tons of ferns, and the tall canopy of tree kept me in the shade most of the way. It was shaping up to be a very warm afternoon (in the 90s) and I was grateful to have a bit of respite from the sun. As much as I tell people I prefer vista hikes over forest hikes, there is one undeniable benefit to hiking under the trees. The luxury of shade!
It turned out to be a fairly easy segment with nice tread, and the next two hours went by quickly. I didn’t take too many photos, and I just kind of got into the groove of walking. I even put in my earbuds and listened to a 40-minute podcast as I trekked alone the trail in the afternoon heat.
As I got near the final stretch of the Panther Segment, I saw a large group of people coming down the trail toward me. They all were wore red construction helmets and were dressed in bright yellow shirts. And most of them seemed to be carrying axes. As they got closer, I could see it was younger group of USFS firefighters.
There weren’t any active fires nearby, so I have to assume they were either doing a little training or clearing something off the trail. But, it was still fun to see this crew out there. Many of my friends and I like to lament and complain about younger people in our society. We focus on how they seem to be addicted to their screens, and don’t seem to be very interested in the outdoors. Yet, the demographics of this USFS crew proves us wrong. There are definitely still some impassioned young folks out there who seem to like the backcountry. Good for them!!
And with that sighting, I was nearly at the end of the segment. Once I got to the Mott Trailhead, I was pleased to see a perfect place to stop for my afternoon snack break. There were several benches in the sun, and a giant trash dumpster at one end of the parking lot where I could dump the past three days of food wrappers from my pack. Woohoo!! Then I spotted a lovely timber frame pit toilet with a porch where I could rest in the shade. Heck, there was even a water spigot nearby to fill up my water bottles before the final trail segment of my day! This might be the best trailhead ever!!
MOTT SEGMENT
As I set out on my final 5.5-mile segment of the day, I turned back to look at the river. In the distance, back toward the trailhead where I’d taken my break, I could see the arch of the Mott Bridge arching over the river. This area of the trail North Umpqua is ofter referred to as the Steamboat Area, and this bridge was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps back in 1936 during the Great Depression!
The bridge was named after Jordan Lawrence Mott, an outdoor writer in the early 20th century who pioneered fishing for steelhead on the North Umpqua River and it’s now considered an Oregon historic civil engineering landmark! It’s amazing to think about what people were able to build without modern machinery, and that it’s still standing today.
The trail was relatively easy for the remainder of the the afternoon, and I saw a few more people using the trail, though none of them were on foot. Part of the Mott Segment makes up of the Riverview Loop, a popular mountain biking route along the river. And so it wasn’t all that surprising that several mountain bikers came up behind me as I hiked this segment of the trail. And I would eventually see even more of them up near the trailhead this evening.
As I got close to my ultimate destination for the day, the Mott Segment traversed an area called the Old Growth Grove. There was a short loop path that diverged from the trail to take hikers out through the grove. But I didn’t end up taking the detour. I did, however, stop to take my photo next to a giant tree that had been sawed through beside the trail. I’m 5’9″ tall, so you can see the diameter of this tree is nearly as tall as me! I can only imagine how old that tree must have been before it eventually fell!
Shortly after the Old Growth Grove, I was walking past some sandy paths that went down to the river that looked promising for a potential stealth campsite or two. I decided to continue on to the Wright Creek Trailhead though, just to see what that held. When I arrived, I could see there was another pit toilet nearby, and a few drive-in primitive campsites set up by the USFS. Plus, there was about a dozen mountain bikers packing their bikes up for the evening.
One of the primitive campsites was already filled by some car campers, and I considered taking one of the other sites nearby. In the end I nixed the idea though. There were shards of broken glass around from prior occupants, and I really didn’t want to be that close to the other people and their two dogs. So, I backtracked and hiked about a tenth of a mile back up the trail to the stealth sites by the river that I’d spotted earlier.
This would do nicely. I wasn’t right on the water like my first night, but I had some river views and it was just a short 50 yard walk down to the some rocks to get to the water. After setting up my tent, it was time to go soak my feet in the cold, refreshing current. Day three had been a nice one. It wasn’t nearly a difficult as yesterday, and I’d seen so many awesome things along the way. Plus, I had the bonus of fresh blackberries. So no complaints from me!
I also realized that I have a mere 16 mile miles to go before I finish this my thru-hike! I’ve made some big miles these past few days, so I’m looking forward to a slightler shorter day before heading to my mom’s house for a nice, warm, relaxing shower!
NUT DAY 3 SUMMARY
HIGHLIGHTS
- Blackberries. So many blackberries!!
- Passing the chinook salmon spawning site at Weeping Rocks. Although the salmon weren’t spawning when I passed, learning more about this process took me right back to my childhood.
- Celebrating the fact that the Calf Segment of the NUT was open! I’m so happy I didn’t have to endure a 3.7-mile road walk on Highway 138 as the truck traffic whizzed by at 60 mph.
- Seeing a USFS crew on the trail! It was super cool to see them out there!
CHALLENGES
- The conflicting signs over whether the Jessie Wright Segment is 4.1 miles or 5.1 miles. Let me resolve the conflict for everyone. It’s 4.1 miles long.
- Lots of foliage on the overgrown sections of trail had me worried about rubbing up against some poison oak. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that I somehow avoided it all.
- These big mile days mean my feet are in gnarly shape. They were still a bit beat up from my Tahoe Rim Trail thru-hike when I started this trail, and now the big toenail on my right foot is completely black. Not a cute look!