House Rock Campground Hike on Tombstone Pass in the Central Oregon Cascade

Where we went and why

We went to the House Rock Campground to do a hike to a waterfall and to see House Rock. The book listed it as an easy 2 mile hike with 200 feet of elevation gain. We were bringing one of the kids back home and this hike was on the way, so we stopped in. It was in the early afternoon when we got there. It was in the mid 70s on a fairly humid day. It was clear, but just so humid! 

How to get there

The hike is on Hwy 20 about 26 miles west of Sweet Home. There are signs on the road warning you that the campground is coming. Shortly after you turn off of Hwy 20, you'll see a sign for the campground to the right. Don't take that one. You'll go over a couple of one lane bridges. After the second one, you'll see a Santiam Wagon Trail on the left. Keep going and you'll see another sign. Park on the right. You'll see a green gate. That's where the hike starts.

The Hike

The hike starts off going downhill pretty gently. That means, you'll be going uphill to get out! Oh fun! The path is pretty wide at the start. The ground was a little squishy. The path narrowed and we had a couple spots where we needed to cross over some water crossing the path. Most of the spots were pretty small and they had some rocks in them that we were able to use as stepping stones. After a bit, we came to a small path to the right. We followed it thinking that it was the path to the waterfall, but it wasn't. 

A little bit later, we saw the sign indicating that the falls was .2 miles to the right. The path was steep in spots and pretty muddy in spots. There was a fallen tree that made it a bit difficult to get to the waterfall, but we made it there. We didn't have to go over the tree though. The waterfall was pretty cool. It wasn't a huge waterfall, but it did have a lot of water coming over it. At the base of the waterfall, there was a small bit of rapids and then it was pretty calm and clear. The color of the water was pretty cool. 

Once we got out fill of the waterfall, we turned around and headed back to the main trail. We turned right and headed to House Rock. The path was pretty muddy in a lot of spots and we had more water crossings. The path went down and stayed along the river. Eventually, we got to House Rock. It's this rather large rock overhang. It wasn't very impressive though. 

The path then looped around and met up with the main trail. We then made our trek back to the car. Since we had come downhill on the hike, we had to go uphill to get back to the car! 

We didn't use our hiking poles at this hike because it was only 2 miles with 200 feet elevation and it was tagged as easy. I regretted that decision! The poles make such a huge difference on the uphills. They would have also come in handy while we were doing the muddy spots and the spots where the water was running across the path. We did the hike after it had been raining for a few days, so I wouldn't recommend that. 

Overall Comments on the Hike

The book labeled this as easy. For anyone who is physically fit, this probably would be an easy hike. However, the path was narrow and muddy in some places and narrow and steep in others. Without my poles and at my current fitness level, this hike was not easy. I really regretted the decision to not bring them. My glutes were getting sore during this hike! I can still feel them tingling now. 

The Video

If you liked the pictures, check out my House Rock Campground YouTube Video.

 

BodyMedia Screen Shot

I didn't do a workout tab from the walk since it's such a battery drain, but here is the calories per minute chart. I thought I would get some vigorous on the way out since it was going downhill at a gentle grade, but it didn't happen. We had to stop periodically. You can see all of those little dips there. 

MapMyHike Screen Shot

The map isn't accurate. We definitely came out on the same path that we went in on. When I started the recording of the hike, MapMyHike did explain that there was a bad GPS signal, but it didn't seem to mess things up in the past. This one was pretty messed up though. So the straight line on here, didn't really happen. 

BackCountry Navigator Screen Shot

This was my BackCountry Navigator screen shot. According to this, the hike was 2.9 miles, but MapMyHike said that it was just over 2. However, MapMyHike had obvious issues since it didn't show us on the same path going in and out. I actually believe this that it was 2.9 miles simply because it took us an hour and a half to complete the hike and according to this our average speed was 1.9 MPH. Which is pretty consistent with what we normally do on a hike. I know we stopped a bit and we went slow on some parts, but we also went pretty fast on other parts. I think I need to get a GPS unit because these apps are obnoxious.