Stand

Things Fall Apart

Wahkeena Creek · Columbia River Gorge · Bridal Veil · Oregon · USA

A familiar scene (for now) to those who have frequented the Columbia River Gorge and Fairy Falls, which resides just two switchbacks up the trail from here to the top left. A couple of switchbacks farther down and back, a massive creekside western red cedar very much similar to the ones seen here lost its grip on the waterlogged soil last year and toppled over against the canyon wall, uplifting its shallow root system as the creek flows on beneath it. With this past wet season’s heavy snowfall and rain, I suspect a number of familiar elements will have changed by the time the dry season is fully upon us, some to be patched up, bolstered, or otherwise modified by industrious workers to restore hazardous washed-out portions of trail and others to be left as reminders of nature’s unrelenting force...and irreproducible beauty.