Champoeg is pronounced sham-poo-y (pretty much). I pronounced it wrong the great majority of the time we were there. It’s a state historic area to commemorate a town where a lot of Oregon’s government and statehood began. The town was washed away in a couple floods, but they have now made it into a state park. We camped there after being in Albany..
It was another beautiful campground with lots of green open space, walking trails, forests, rivers/creeks, and a nature playscape right next to the campground.
The day after we arrived there, we drove down to Silver Falls State Park. It’s a popular state park known for its Trail of Ten Falls – a 7-8 mile loop where you get to see 10 impressive waterfalls. It was really beautiful and we’ve got lots of pictures (sorry I didn’t caption them all!).
On the drive back to our campground, we were able to see more of the landscape (it was cloudy/foggy on the way there), and I was able to get a picture of the many Christmas tree farms we drove through on the way there. (Made me think of my Grandpa Koop!)
The next day we went over to the visitor center at the Champoeg to learn more about the area. It was once a large and significant town in Oregon’s history, but huge floods on the Willamette River washed it away. Amazingly no one died. We also learned that Oregon became a state in 1859, before Colorado (1876), even though it is quite a bit further west. Besides the explorers that took paths there, it is also a very lush place that is similar to the east, so we guessed people were able to survive there more easily than other low water areas of the west. Also, Oregon is the only state that has a two-sided flag!
We walked down to the actual town site where the roads that were once there are marked. There’s a stone marker there honoring the people that voted to create Oregon’s first government in 1843.
Then in the afternoon we stopped by a hazelnut orchard on our way to Portland. In Portland we went to Powell’s Books (the original one). It was a neat place that we’ve heard about. We visited the Rare Books section and saw their oldest book which was published on August 11, 1494! Really cool.
From there we drove out to Hillsboro where we had dinner with one of Matt’s friends from growing up – Heather and Rian and their daughter. Matt and I had visited them years ago after we did the John Muir Trail (and Matt had been there since for work as well), so it was nice to catch up and meet their daughter. We enjoyed a lovely time. The kids had fun. The food was delicious. The conversation flowed. And we even got some protest frog souvenirs that we’re excited to wear back in Colorado Springs! (Unfortunately we forgot to get a picture together.)
Oregon has been a lovely state. We look forward to coming back someday and exploring it more!
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