Afoot and Afield: Portland/Vancouver. Douglas Lorain

      You begin by a sign saying that Hidden Falls is 4.75 miles away. Walk through a pleasantly rustic picnic area, and then turn right at an unsigned junction. Soon thereafter you come to a second junction—this one with the Tarbell Trail, which is heavily used by horses. The sign here says that Hidden Falls is now 5.8 miles away. Apparently the falls is not only hidden, it is also a moving target! Actually neither sign is correct. Hidden Falls is actually 4.9 miles away.

      Turn left onto the Tarbell Trail, which wanders gradually uphill in a typical, second-growth, Douglas-fir forest. With just over a century of growth since the 1902 Yacolt Burn, most of the trees are little more than 1 foot thick, but a few are as much as 3 feet thick and nearly 100 feet tall. Vegetation covers almost every square inch of the forest floor, especially Oregon grape, oxalis, thimbleberry, salal, false lily-of-the-valley, and sword and bracken fern. There are also lots of vine maples, whose leaves turn scarlet and orange in late October.

      Two switchbacks climb past the edge of a clear-cut and take you up to a crossing of a narrow gravel road. The small seam of sunlight created by this road is just enough for June-blooming iris to thrive. Continuing past this junction, you make a series of gentle climbs and level walks through dense foliage that creates a sort of living tunnel. In places horse hooves have churned the tread into a muddy mess, so wear boots rather than tennis shoes.

      After topping a low rise, you turn east and cross a very isolated old road in the middle of an equally old clear-cut. Trailside thimbleberry and the enormous spreading fronds of bracken fern are racing to capture as much light as possible before the rapidly regrowing Douglas firs cover them with a shady canopy. Shortly after reentering an older forest, you cross a rarely used motorcycle track and then wander along the south side of low and rounded Klootchman Butte. Several openings in the forest provide room for flowers like vetch, iris, golden pea, dandelion, beargrass, and wild rose. There are also some partially obstructed views of Silver Star Mountain to the southeast and Larch Mountain to the south. The trail loses some elevation among the trees and crosses more partially forested slopes before making a long, looping contour into a densely forested valley on the northwest side of Silver Star Mountain.

      You should eventually come to a junction with a newly constructed route that is part of the planned Chinook Trail, which will one day be a loop route along both sides of the Columbia River Gorge. This section of it leaves the Tarbell Trail and goes to the left on its way to Silver Star Mountain. The signs here give distances to various destinations, but like the signs at the trailhead, these are not to be trusted. One sign claims that it is only 2 miles back to the Tarbell Picnic Area where you started. The actual distance is close to 3.5 miles.