Oregon

The National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center is a 500 acre site managed by the Bureau of Land Management. The large interpretive center building contains exhibits that tell the compelling story of the Oregon Trail and the emigrant experience.

Engineers constructing the Old Mt. Hood Loop Highway found this forgotten trailside grave, hidden by vegetation, in 1924. An interpretive exhibit tells the story and a boulder with a plaque commemorates the unknown woman who died near here, just 50 miles from the Willamette Valley. The “grave trail” down from Barlow Pass approaches from the opposite side of the road.

For emigrants, today's Birnie Park was more than just a place along the Oregon Trail. It was also an important camping and staging area. In order to leave Grande Ronde Valley and continue on the Trail, emigrants faced a nearly 1000 ft. climb up steep valley walls. Teams of oxen had to be combined in order to pull the wagons up this rise. The area now known as Birnie Park provided a perfect location to do this.

Birch Creek Trail Site is a Bureau of Land Management site where the actual path made by emigrants, livestock, and wagons traveling the Oregon Trail is still a hiking path. Visitors are welcome to hike this quarter mile long section of the Oregon Trail across the sagebrush plains as it heads toward the Snake River.

Barlow Pass, at 4,160 ft., is the highest point on the Barlow Road. From this area, you can access the upper trailhead for the Pioneer Woman’s Grave Trail #485. This trail winds through conifer forest for about 1.2 miles to the Pioneer Woman’s Grave (3,720’ elev.). The path cuts across a broad, northerly bend in OR-35, following the territorial stage route across Barlow Pass and intersects portions of the original Barlow Road along the way.

Columbia Gorge Discovery Center & Museum is located on a 54-acre point of land adjacent to the Columbia River and is the interpretive center for the Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area. This area includes one of the oldest continuously occupied places in North America (over 11,000 years) and parts of the Lewis and Clark and Oregon Trails.

Obtained as a gift from Mark Mayer in 1924, the Rowena Crest Viewpoint is a paved overlook located near the top of the high bluffs on the south side of the Columbia River. It offers magnificent views of the Columbia River Gorge, interpretive exhibits, and hiking trails through a nature preserve. When the spring wildflowers are in bloom, this is one of the most stunning vistas in the Gorge.

For the descent of Laurel Hill, immigrants locked their wagon wheels and dragged huge logs under their wagons to slow their slide down the 60 % grade. An informational sign and 1-mile roundtrip interpretive walk with a view of the precipitous Laurel Hill “chute” descent, is located at small pullout on Highway 26 near Government Camp.

Financed by businessman Philip Foster, Sam Barlow hired a road crew to improve his trail, which opened as a one-way toll road in 1846. The fifth and final tollgate on the turnpike operated here from 1883 to 1915. Interpretive signs tell the story. Nearby, a replica gate stands between two maple trees, which are believed to have been planted by one of the last tollgate keepers.

The primary route of the Oregon Trail passed through Echo Meadows from 1847-1860. Just four miles from the Umatilla River crossing, emigrants did not stop or camp here, but they left signs of their passing nonetheless. Deep wagon swales were created as the emigrants passed through the meadows, which remain to this day.