Today we went to the Columbia Gorge and hiked the trail to Punch Bowl falls. Along the way we also saw Melakata (sp?) falls and the lower Punch Bowl falls. We started out around 10am and hit Burger King for a tasty and nutritious breakfast. 
Then we headed to the Columbia Gorge. However, before we got out of Portland Jessica had thrown up. We stopped at an Arby’s in Troutdale just before leaving civilization to get cleaned up. Around 12:30am, we made it to the trailhead. There are two parking area’s. One at the trailhead and another about a half mile away. We drove up to the closer one assuming we’d just let people out then I’d go park the car. When we got there we saw several people (backpackers) around there car and they said they’d be leaving in just a few minutes and we could have their parking spot. Score! We asked them how the trail was and if it would be okay to take a bike stroller on. They said that we’d have no problem… later we were wondering where they got that idea. They were a burly group (with no kids), so maybe THEY wouldn’t have any problems.
The trail is 1.5 miles to Punch Bowl. We started walking and it was a good trail for the first 1/4 mile or so. Then it got bumpy, then it got ledgy, then it got so we had to carry the stroller or “one-wheel” it. But it was a very beautiful hike. I couldn’t get the map plugin to work, so here is a link to the kml file. It can be viewed in Google Earth: http://nomad.webhop.org/kml/2012/20120512_punch_bowl_falls.kml
Slideshow (88 pictures):
When we were at the over look for punch bowl falls we saw some people standing right above them. Jessica and Rob decided to go find out how to get down there. Here are 3 videos of that:
We ate lunch at the lower Punch bowl falls. There were a lot of people down there. In order to get a good picture of Punch Bowl falls you have to wade out into the water. It was FREAZING! After just about 30 seconds our feet started going numb. When we were out Jessica’s lips were blue and Ashley refused to go back in.
Here is a video of that:
By the time we were ready to leave to go back to the car we were pretty much exhausted. We started back and came upon a girl and two guys (Ruby, Wes (Jessica swears his name was sweat) and Andrew) who were heading down the trail. Ruby didn’t have any shoes on (which we thought was odd) and we almost passed by them. As we did, Joli asked Ruby if she wanted to borrow the water shoes that we had. She said she did and we thought that would be the end of it. Instead they stuck with us the whole way down the trail. They helped carry the stroller in the skinny spots and took turns pushing it as well. Joli said, they were an answer to her prayer! And it’s interesting that the answer didn’t come until after we’d served them (by offering the shoes).
We finally made it home around 8pm. A fun, long, deadly 
, amazing, tiring, bumpy, wet 3 mile hike.
Some funny things:
- Jessica and Tessa were out ahead on the way home and Jessica tripped and scraped here knee. She was upset and crying and Tessa was comforting her and she suddenly saw the rest of us getting close. She stopped crying, jumped up and started running to get out ahead of us again. She was determined to be the first one back and she was!
- Ashley got a little scared about the cliff that we were walking on and she did a panicked squeal then turned to Joli and said, “Right?!?”
- Livia fell asleep in the stroller. She was surrounded by backpacks and stuff and the ride was VERY bumpy. We think it was her way of coping. She fell asleep on the way there and the way back.
