Forever on Our Mind: Everything Changes on Angel's Rest
In which I go on my first "real" hike—and begin to fall in love with the Columbia River Gorge
97. Everything Changes on Angel's Rest
April 2006:
Maybe a mile into our hike, Dusty stops so I can catch my breath. The lanky ginger turns his attention from my sweat-drenched T-shirt, desperate panting, and grief-stricken face to a rocky citadel, crowned by Douglas-fir trees, that reaches toward the sky from atop the hillside before us. “I think that's Angel’s Rest up there,” he says. “I think that’s where we're going.”
It can’t be possible. Until this moment, I assumed the final viewpoint lurked just around the next bend. I’m convinced that we’ve already traveled five miles on this 4.6-mile round-trip trail—and that we’ve climbed more than 3,000 feet on this hike that promised just 1,500 feet of elevation gain. At this point, I expect us to dodge 747s taking off from the nearby Portland International Airport.
I put my hands on my knees, let the sweat rain from my rosy forehead, and breathlessly wonder: “Are you sure?”
He’s sure. We return to the trail.
Growing up, I went outside only to check the mail, stopped riding my bike after passing my driver's test, and dropped out of Boy Scouts after six months because I found it “too outdoorsy.” Whether at 7 or 17, my idea of “getting outdoors” meant walking to 7-11 for a hot dog and a Big Gulp. The Columbia River Gorge always sat a short drive from my doorstep, but I never viewed it from anywhere but the passenger window. Even then, I typically spent more time playing Game Boy or complaining about slow drivers on Interstate 84, the region’s main thoroughfare, than I did admiring its natural grandeur.
And what grandeur I missed out on.
The Columbia River Gorge began forming up to 17 million years ago when the first of the Columbia River Basalt lava flows began sending literal tons of basalt rock into modern-day Idaho, Washington, and Oregon. Those eruptions took place over the course of about 11 million years and formed much of western Oregon as we know it today.
But the Gorge really started taking shape with the arrival of the Missoula Floods, the oldest of which occurred more than 10,000 years ago. Each flood followed a similar pattern: Glacial Lake Missoula would fill with water in modern-day Montana, and the ice dam holding that water back would eventually rupture—sending torrents of water and debris westward at about 65 MPH. Each flood chipped away at the basalt that had solidified millions of years ago, finally leaving behind an 85-mile-long gorge that today spans two states, is bookended by two rivers, and is up to 4,000 feet deep.
Even then, those numbers don't really capture the beauty and scope of the Columbia River Gorge—a federally protected National Scenic Area that draws hikers, cyclists, wind surfers, and campers from around the world. Today, ridges, rock formations, and jagged spires rise from the banks of the Columbia River, their slopes covered with thick blankets of Douglas-fir. The Oregon side of the gorge hosts the highest concentration of waterfalls in North America—more than 90, in all—including Multnomah Falls, which at about 620 feet tall is among the state’s tallest.
I first got curious about what I’d been missing when I started losing weight last year and wanted to break up my elliptical machine routine with something a bit more scenic than muted televisions at the gym. So when Dusty suggested we hike Angel's Rest, not far from the Portland area’s eastern edge, I threw on a cotton T-shirt and laced up the Shaquille O’Neal-branded basketball shoes I’d acquired from Ross—the closest thing I had to hiking boots—and said, “Sure.”
At that point, he offered a poetic note of caution: “It’s going to smoke your balls”—the implication being that I’d have a tough time and that this wasn’t a beginner-friendly hike.
I waved off the warning almost reflexively. After all, I’d hiked Beacon Rock nearby a few years back, gaining some 700 feet along the way—and lived to tell the tale. So how hard could this be?
Even with the memories of that hike haunting my brain, I pictured something straight out of the Shire. With a wooden walking stick in hand and a piece of hay hanging out of my mouth, we’d follow gently rolling hillsides with the sun giving us a pleasant shoulder rub the whole way. When we needed a breather, I’d pull a ruby-red apple from my bindle, polish it on my shirt before digging in, and feed the core to friendly deer grazing in open meadows.
Never mind that there are no gently rolling hillsides in the Columbia River Gorge, that I almost never ate apples, and that I didn’t own a bindle; I didn’t know what I didn’t know!
Yet as we headed east on Interstate 84 this cool, sunny April morning, Dusty’s ominous warning inched closer to the front of my thoughts: What did he really mean by “It’s going to smoke your balls”?
I find out—and realize my mistake—almost as soon as he parks at the trailhead.
The never-ending ascents and relentless switchbacks start the second we step onto the trail. Within seconds, I’m scaling a real-life M.C. Escher painting, punctuated only occasionally by the briefest of level stretches—long enough for me to gather my thoughts, consider feigning a sprained ankle, and suggest turning around. After a few minutes, the novelty of being “in the woods” gives way to a painstaking, mind-numbing reality. The trees all look the same; the fir-fresh air gets lost in my labored breaths; and “on your left” rings out from skinnier, swifter hikers more often—and more loudly—than the birdsongs surrounding us. I’ve never been so miserable in my life.
A handful of progressively higher viewpoints invite me to stop and catch my breath, but I’m too winded to care about the ever-expanding Columbia River before me. This Sisyphean punishment rebukes all those years of couch potato malaise. The bill for all those $5 Little Caesars pizzas has come due, and my heart is physically unable to pay. I pine for my Xbox and a Big Mac. This must be what drowning feels like.
Dusty maintains a steady lead of a few hundred feet, stopping every few minutes to ask how I’m doing (even though he knows damn well how I’m doing). As promised, my balls are indeed smoked. And as I soon learn, we’re not even close to the summit.
In between those all-too-brief breaks, I slog through the towering forest, tap-dance along a slippery rock scramble, and walk among a burned-out graveyard of trees—the last remnants of a forest fire that swept through these parts in 1991. On subsequent hikes to Angel’s Rest, I will marvel at the juxtaposition of these landscapes and natural features—how the beauty and tragedy co-exist alongside and on top of each other in perfect harmony. But at this moment, I debate whether to end my friendship with Dusty now … or back at the trailhead. I power through the pain long enough to realize I may not have a ride back to town if I end the friendship now.
We scramble to the summit before I decide. There, 270-degree views of the Gorge radiate for miles. Unspoiled by even a puff of cloud cover, Dusty points out Beacon Rock and Hamilton Mountain to the east, Cape Horn and Silver Star Mountain to the north, and the outskirts of Portland to the west. The mighty Columbia River snakes through the basalt, as it’s done for thousands of years.
I sit down, chug what’s left in my water bottle, and try to process the high-def display around me. Everywhere I look, verdant trees, angular rocks, and the shimmering Columbia River pop in ways that my point-and-shoot will never capture. Cars zoom by below at 70 MPH. If I squint hard enough, I can see my old self speeding along toward Hood River, oblivious to all but the road ahead.
I scan the landscape and try to remember the view like I’m cramming for a midterm. Like most of those tests, there’s too much to digest in one sitting. So when Dusty asks how I liked it on the way down, I tell him I want to come back. That I should look into a pair of hiking boots after my feet are a little less swollen. That I’d like to try an easier hike next weekend. That I never imagined how beautiful this corner of our world could be.
I don't yet know if it was worth the effort, but I feel like Mother Nature taught me an important lesson. I am eager to learn more.
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