1 min
Overview
NOTICE: Most of the Clatsop Spit area will be closed for several years as crews work on shoring up the jetty. You can only walk as far as the wildlife viewing blind from Parking Lot D. This hike along a beach is a very pleasant walk in good weather, not only for the vistas of river and ocean, but also the congregations of wildlife. Vast flocks of brown pelicans, Caspian terns, and double-crested cormorants congregate at the "bottleneck" that is the mouth of the Columbia to feed off of salmon smolts. In the flat sedge lands and thickets, look for elk and enjoy the views to Cape Disappointment and large freighters making their way to Portland. When Lewis and Clark camped near here, the southern end of the mouth of the Columbia was at Point Adams, where the town of Hammond is now located - a few miles to the east. The area of this walk was in their time a mere shoal, completely submerged at the height of the tide. Since then, the construction of the South Jetty and the Columbia River dam system, as well as the dredging of a shipping channel, have conspired to thrust the coastline farther into the Pacific Ocean. In geological terms, Clatsop Spit is in fact the entire sandy plain that extends north from Tillamook Head to the river mouth, the result of sediment deposits by the river itself since the last ice age. The dynamic ebb and flow of what was essentially a sand “desert” has been altered by trapping of sediments behind the dams, the building of the river mouth jetties, and the planting of dune grass, which has stabilized the landscape and allowed colonization by shore pine, Sitka spruce, willow, and wax-myrtle. The spit lies wholly within Fort Stevens State Park. Begin the hike at Parking Lot D and walk to the wildlife viewing blind overlooking the tidal flats of Jetty Lagoon, also called Trestle Bay. The 6 ½ mile South Jetty stretches from Point Adams across the lagoon and is accompanied by the ruins of a wooden trestle, which carried the trains used in the jetty’s construction. Elk are often seen in th
Trail Stats
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Photos
400px-Clatsop_Spit
400px-Clatsop_Spit
250px-Pelicans
250px-Pelicans
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250px-ClatsopSpit1
250px-Elk
250px-Elk
400px-Driftwood
400px-Driftwood