From logging to recreation at Loon Lake

About 1400 years ago, a massive slide in the Coast Range blocked a river that flowed into the Umpqua River near Reedsport. The persistent rains of the Oregon Coast gradually filled in a lake behind the natural dam and Loon Lake was formed. It was discovered by white settlers around 1850, when two men following Indian trails stumbled across it, a half dozen miles upstream from the Umpqua.

People talk about the "last mile" of Internet connection as being the most difficult. In logging, it's the first mile from where the tree falls. Loon Lake provided a solution for trees along its banks, which were put into the lake and taken to the east end where they were loaded in trucks and taken to a mill in nearby Gardiner. The logging road provided automobile access for the first time, and the lake became a recreation area. There is little logging in the area anymore and the loading area at the end of the lake is now a campground run by the federal government. A privately owned lodge, Loon Lake Resort, operates year round.

One of the interesting items at the lodge is a massive sculpture, created from a single piece of old growth fir, in the shape of a bird. It's a lovely piece of art, but it certainly appears to be a pelican. Personally, I wouldn't know a pelican from a loon, but that's what the manager told me. It seems odd, to have the artistic centerpiece of Loon Lake Lodge be a pelican, but if you stop in, it's worth looking at closely.