photo by Tim Giraudier/Beautiful Oregon Photography

No place better represents what the Oregon Coast Range once looked like than Devil’s Staircase. Named for the iconic cascading waterfall on Wasson Creek, which tumbles through magnificent old-growth forests, into the lower Smith River then the lower Umpqua River, Devil’s Staircase’s beauty is unrivaled. Yet it remains unprotected, and was recently threatened with clearcutting by the Bureau of Land Management, the federal agency that oversees part of its management.

This remarkable area, which houses centuries-old conifer forests and a host of endangered species, has been proposed for Wilderness since the 1980s, but has never received the protection it deserves. Cascadia Wildlands worked for over a decade, with a potent coalition, to designate the 30,000-acre forested area as Oregon’s next Wilderness and Wasson Creek as a Wild and Scenic waterway to ensure it is safeguarded forever. Representative Peter DeFazio (D-OR) and Senators Ron Wyden (D-OR) and Jeff Merkley (D-OR) continuously championed the respective bills through Congress. For more information click here.  Please see recent updates.

Hiking into the Devil’s Staircase Wilderness Area: 2019 Summer Series

For the 2019 summer, we have planned a 3-part series of hikes occurring in June, July, and August. A Cascadia Wildlands hike leader will take a limited number of participants into various sections of the newly designated wilderness area for an all-day excursion into this incredible landscape. Each hike in the series will visit a different location within the Wilderness Area, please check each date’s signup page to learn location specifics.