Walking with Wendy
Champoeg State Park March For Parks
April 19, 1997
The weather was pretty grim on Saturday - wind and rain. I had
signed up to work at our Walking Connection Club's March For Parks walk at
Champoeg State Park near Donald, Oregon. I volunteered to be the trail sweeper, the person
who takes down the trail markings. I dressed carefully for the weather in water-resistant
pants and found my vinyl raincoat as opposed to the space-age Gortex one. The rain was
really nasty on the way to the park, which is about 20 miles from my home.
Champoeg State
Park is the birthplace of Oregon - this is where the first Oregon government was formed.
Each summer they hold a historical pageant. The park borders on the Willamette River and
had a great deal of destruction in the floods of 1996 and 1997. The Walking Connection
Club has a Year-Round Walk in the park, a
trail which is walked self-guided using a map and directions any day at the walker's
convenience. As a part of March For Parks, on this Saturday the club marked the trail with
our pink ribbons and arrows and manned the start/finish point.
The rain tapered
off after I arrived at the park and loaded up the club's gear to borrow for use at the Vancouver Discovery Walk next weekend. I purchased
the March For Parks patch as the event award and the Champoeg hatpin. Proceeds from the
sales of the patches go to support the park. The club had about 70 walkers - many of them
volksmarchers who decided to walk closer to home this weekend due to the weather.
The walk
proceeds around the park, which has both forest and many meadows. Bird feeders dot the
roads and trails and spring songbirds were making good use of them. Hawks also circled. I
was able to remove my raincoat as I walked along collecting the ribbons and arrows. The
spring woods showed bright green new foliage, and I heard that one walking family counted
24 different species of flowers. I didn't pick out that many - no trilliums that I saw,
but there were plenty of little yellow flowers and dogwood. The trees here are a mixture
of Douglas fir, birch, alder, oak.
The trail was
spongy in places, but at the points where it would have been muddy the park had put down
barkdust. The usual start point is the Visitors Center, but today we started at the
covered picnic shelter that is 3 kilometers into the route. So when I arrived at the
Visitors Center I was happy to use their flush toilets, get a drink of water from the
fountain, and look around at their historical displays. The usual start box is on the
porch of the Visitors Center. Walkers can come any day the park is open, sign in the log,
take a map and enjoy the route.
The walk then
finished along the trail adjoining the Willamette River (this would be the beginning of
the walk normally). The flood water had drowned the trail earlier in year, but the park
had scooped the flood mud off the trail and piled it alongside. The mud did not smell very
good - I guess the Willamette is not a pristine river, certainly not during a flood!
This was a very
easy and pleasant 6-mile walk with no significant hills, all in natural surroundings of
fields and forests. A great getaway for a family, as well as a chance to learn about
Oregon history. It was good to be able to support the park through my participation in
this March for Parks. Many thanks to Marge Bergeron, Peggy Misner, and Lois Hooker who
staffed the event.
