1 min
Overview
For a diversion while you are in Cannon Beach, try this short walk and interpretive trail around wastewater treatment ponds teeming with waterfowl. The trail leads to a mossy spruce forest, and then back past wetlands to Ecola Creek and out to its mouth at Kramer Point. There are numerous interpretive signs that describe the bird and plant life, the effects of the 1964 tsunami, and wastewater treatment processes. Take binoculars and your bird guide! From the main parking areas, walk north to 2nd Street, and go right past the restrooms. After the skate park, see a trail leading left with a sign describing the aftermath of the 1964 tsunami: this will be the second part of the walk. Pass more parking at the treatment lagoons, and pick up the trail that circles the lagoons. Begin walking clockwise, taking in the interpretive signs and the raised viewing platform that allows you to scope for waterfowl. In the winter months, you’re likely to see quite a variety of water birds, from coots and pied-billed grebes to buffleheads, hooded mergansers, and green-winged teals. Keep to the outside path and turn a corner. To your left is an alder/spruce ditch, with noisy Highway 101 traffic running behind the screen of trees. Round the southwest corner of the lagoons, and pass a blackwater swamp on your left before going left at a fence line. At a junction with a paved trail, go left. The trail rises through an elderberry/sword fern thicket into a mossy Sitka spruce forest. When you reach Elm Street, you can return and continue walking clockwise (to your left) around the wastewater site. You’ll pass aeration basins where gulls and mallards feast off the surface scum. Reach a footbridge that crosses an alder/spruce swamp, and pick up the gravel trail along the west side of the lagoons. The restored Little Pompey Wetlands, which once again are receiving some tidal flow after being blocked for decades, are to your left. Reach 2nd Street, and head to the paved trail just east of the skate park. A sign here describes the afte
Trail Stats
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Photos
400px-CannonBeachNatureLoopMap
400px-CannonBeachNatureLoopMap
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250px-Barn_on_Ecola_Creek_from_Fir_Street_Bridge%2C_Cannon_Beach_Nature_Trail
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250px-Big_stride%2C_Cannon_Beach_Nature_Trail
400px-Overlooking_the_sludge_lagoons%2C_Cannon_Beach_Nature_Trail
400px-Overlooking_the_sludge_lagoons%2C_Cannon_Beach_Nature_Trail