Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Bright green moss is everywhere: hanging from the trees, lining the trails, coating the damp wooden railings on the banks of the Sandy River. The color seems otherworldly, like something out of a dream.

A tiny brown mushroom springs up atop an old, fallen log. A budding fern frond is coiled up tightly in a spiral. A thick slug crawls across the damp forest floor.

This radiant coat of green greets Oxbow Regional Park come early spring, when rain has reliably soaked the riverside forest. With that rain now beginning to fall, we've entered the first stage in its damp, seasonal transformation.



READ MORE: The 12 best rainy day hikes around Oregon

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Morning mist hangs over the Sandy River, seen from a viewpoint at Oxbow Park in April.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Moss covered a wooden railing alongside a trail beside the Sandy River.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

A fern front unfurls for the spring.

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A lot of hikers hibernate when the rainy days return to western Oregon, opting for a fireplace over a day spent in the elements. It’s understandable, but as any green-blooded Oregonian will tell you, the best way to cope with the rain is to embrace it.

There are plenty of good rainy day hikes close to Portland – Silver Falls State Park comes to mind, along with the many waterfalls of the Columbia River Gorge – but Oxbow, found near Troutdale, seems particularly well suited for a quiet day of exploring in the rain.



There are 12 miles of trails that run through Oxbow, leading hikers through a dense, old-growth forest and along the banks of the Sandy River. During summer, it's filled with floaters and boaters. In early fall, mushroom hunters forage for chanterelles and boletes, while salmon return to spawn in the shallows.



Winter and early spring are the seasons for green moss and gray skies, the park a place of perpetual dampness.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Rain drips off the end of a fir branch.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

A snail crosses the trail on a rainy day.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Fresh moss and new spring growth cover the park in a radiant shade of green.

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Oxbow is set up for exploration, truly a choose-your-own-adventure kind of place. Trailheads line the one road that runs through the park, trails crisscrossing and connecting the banks of the river with lush forest. The road ends at a boat launch and campground, where you can set off onto the river, set up camp, or hike even farther into the woods.

While most of the hiking trails are relatively flat, an old gravel road near the boat launch offers some momentary elevation gain leading to the top of Alder Ridge, where another forested trail rings Elk Meadow and connects to an equestrian trailhead at the edge of the park.

From Alder Ridge you can peer through the barren branches at the snaking curve of the Sandy River, carving its way to the Columbia Gorge. Like the gorge, this stretch of river shows signs of ancient floods that have long since receded: Find an old, fallen tree in the forest and you might find river stones and agates lodged between its roots.

It’s this kind of quiet exploration that makes a rainy day at Oxbow so great. In this part of Oregon, you don’t really know a forest until you’ve seen it in the rain. It’s the gray days of winter when its character emerges, its life force sprung to life in a vibrant shade of green.

--Jamie Hale | jhale@oregonian.com | @HaleJamesB



SEE MORE PHOTOS BELOW

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

A small mushroom grows on a moss-covered log.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

The Sandy River bends through the park, seen from a viewpoint atop Alder Ridge.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

An old sign warns hikers of flash flooding along the Sandy River.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Moss-covered branches arc over a trail.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

Ferns grow fresh beneath a stand of red alders on Alder Ridge in the park.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

The Sandy River runs past a rocky bank on a gray spring day.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

A group campground shelter is covered in moss.

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Jamie Hale/The Oregonian

A sweet trillium flower opens for the spring, finding sun under the shelter of a rotting log.