Columbia Hills State Park - Crawford Ranch Trail, Columbia Hills State Park - Horsethief Butte — Sunday, Apr. 23, 2023

After setting up camp at Maryhill SP, we drove to the Dalles Mountain Ranch area to check on the flower status. The lupine and balsamroot are starting to bloom, but it seems it will be 2-3 weeks before they will be at peak bloom! A few lupine had open blossoms, but most were still just buds. There were many yellow desert parsley and barestem desert parsley blooming in the fields along the Dalles Mountain Road as you are driving to the ranch. A small area along the road had large head clover blooming amidst the barestem desert parsley and these were very pretty. The wind was blowing 20-30 MPH with stronger gusts so we did not hike the ranch area today, but plan to do so on Thursday which is our last day before having to go home.  We drove to the Horsethief Butte Trail where the wind was still strong, but we wanted some walking after our long drive to camp so we walked a short section of the trail. Yellow desert parsley, Oregon grape, death camas, prairie stars, fiddleneck, and a few blooming balsamroot were seen. We saw one blooming wild cucumber with many, many more in the bud stage.