Hike to Munra Point, Apr 18th

teI had originally planned to go backpacking this weekend but that did not materialized. Instead, I did to really beautiful hikes with Li. The first one was to Munra Point, a rock formation in the Columbia River Gorge right above Bonneville dam. This trail is not maintained but easier to follow than Rock of Ages where I got lost last time. This hike can be started from three different places although two of them are not very safe for cars. We started from the Wahclella falls parking lot towards the Gorge trail that follows next to the river. After about a mile and a half, there’s a small detour and shortly after the sign indicating you are entering a non-maintained trail. From that point on, the trail climbs rather quickly thru a dense forest and comes up to an impressive viewpoint. We knew from the start this hike is considered the steepest in the Gorge and also the one with he best view. The first view point proved both. Once you get to the end of the rocks, the views of the river are just breathtaking. The trail from that point forward doesn’t change much; you are climbing all the time on a rocky ridge towards the top. As you’ll se in the pictures, flowers were in full bloom so beside the amazing views, we had those to admire as well. We did pass a couple of spots where a little scrambling was required to continue up, but after passing those spots, we found ourselves on top of a rock formation that has three ridges. One ridge was the one we were on, another going north east and another going South. In the middle of these was the tip of the formation known as Munra Point. Before going to Munra, we decided to walk on the second ridge mainly to get closer to the incredible views. Once back and after several pictures, we climbed the little portion to the top of Munra where we spent some time having lunch, taking some more pictures and enjoying a light lunch. After lunch but before starting heading back down, we went on a side walk on the southern ridge to explore a bit. Going down was as much fun as going up. Once we got back to the car, as if we didn’t have enough hiking for the day, we decided to do the Wahclella falls loop which, in comparison, was just a walk in the park.