Mt. Tabor Park

After reading about this city park and knowing that Mount Tabor was once an extinct cinder cone volcano within city limits (there are only two other places like this in the U.S. and the other location was also in Oregon). We knew we had to go here...

We parked at the Yamhill entrance. There are several ways to get up to the park.

Ooh, look at that address! The number of the Beast (with an extra 6)...Cue the music from "Carmina Burana" here!

The rain had already stopped but it was still pretty damp outside. It smelled so fresh and clean here. It also helps that everything is so nice and green. I love seeing the moss covered trees.

We found out that "Tabor" is pronounced liked "labor", not "tah-bore" (which I thought it was).

The park is also home to several water reservoirs that service the city.

We paid a quick stop to the visitor center...

The gentleman working there was very nice and enthusiastic about his job. He was more than happy to chat it up with us and several other folks who dropped in at the same time.

He showed us where the oldest and tallest trees were (seen below). You can tell since the base of these trees were wider than the rest.

Cool place to have a picnic! And more of the trees...

There are miles of hiking trails. We explored just a few of them. TC and I pretty much wore our knee high waterproof Timberland boots the whole trip, save for a few of the nicer days.

The park is 196 acres and sits atop an extinct volcanic butte. The park offers a beautiful forest like setting with great views like the one below. If you look closely, you can see a bit of one of the reservoirs.

The visitor center guide also told us of this statue. This is Harvey W. Scott, newspaper editor of The Oregonian; he was also a historian and an early Portland pioneer.

What is significant about this statue is it's creator. Do you see the name there? Does it ring a bell to any of you history buffs?

Gutzon Borglum, a Danish sculptor, was commissioned to build a statue in Harvey Scott's memory. Scott died in 1925 and the statue was completed three years later. Gutzon Borglum is also the sculptor of one of America's most famous landmarks, Mount Rushmore. While looking up facts about this guy for this post, I also saw that Borglum was a member of the KKK which pretty much diminishes him in my eyes.

We noticed many daffodils throughout Portland. Mt. Tabor park was no exception. There were just coming up...

Map of the park:

Another one of the trails...

We saw lots of walkers and joggers that day. Nice place to get some exercise in.

We also had fun at the playground. I could only traverse about three bars. My hands were hurting from gripping those cold metal bars! TC almost made it the whole way across...

I hadn't been on one of these in years!

All that walking around tired us out. Plus we were hungry, so it was time to leave...

More about Mount Tabor here:

The Oregon Encyclopedia
Friends of Mt. Tabor
Mt. Tabor Neighborhood Association

Up next...a visit to one of Portland's many "food pods"!