Last weekend, I headed out for a Winter adventure up the Mckenzie River to see the Blue Pool in the snow. Blue Pool, also called Tamolitch Pool (from the Chinook word for “bucket”), is the site of an old waterfall where the Mckenzie River emerges from beneath basalt lava flows, forming a clear blue pool before tumbling along on it’s course. In low water flows, the water follows the path of least resistance into the porous basalt flowing underground for 3.5 miles from the base of the Carmen reservoir and emerging here at the Blue Pool.
My adventure partner, Corey, and I set out with snowshoes in case no trail was broken, but it turned out some folks had gone in ahead of us and blazed a trail through the deep snow. We made faster time hiking along through their tracks than we would have with the snowshoes, which was fine as it was later in the afternoon when we started, and we weren’t sure we would be back before nightfall.
With both of us being hardy hikers, we made it to the pool in good time, and enjoyed the reflections of trees surrounding the deep round pool of midnight blue water. He described to me the bright blue color of the pool on sunny days, which I could easily imagine with how brilliantly deep blue the water was in the fading light with cloudy winter skies. It was an impressive sight to behold, with the river flowing along as if coming out of nowhere. The best part was, we had this frequently visited destination all to ourselves on this peaceful wintry evening.
We turned back from the pool just as darkness set in, but found that we didn’t even need our headlamps with the moon shining bright, and the well worn tracks through the white snow. We enjoyed a moonlit hike back through the forest along the Mckenzie River, which made for quite a romantic adventure. We made it back to share piping hot homemade pizza and brew a beer with friends. Although hiking by the light of the moon wasn’t the plan in this case, I would gladly try it again sometime. It was great fun. Knowing my adventure partner as I do, I’m sure I can count on it.
That sounds just wonderful. 🙂