Fire Lane 13A

Fire Lane 13A is a spur off a spur: a tenth of a mile of dirt that peels off Fire Lane 13 about halfway down, cuts “one hill over” under the powerlines, and quits on the ridge above Harborton Creek. Together with its parent lane, it’s one of only two fire lanes in the whole park that dead-end in the middle of nowhere — no loop, no thru-route, no connection down to Highway 30. You walk out, you look at some powerlines, you walk back up.

So here’s the honest verdict: this one is a footnote, and it knows it. There’s a modest glimpse of the Multnomah Channel and the bridge through the powerline gap, but the real view — the one worth the long trip to this corner — belongs to Fire Lane 13 and its picnic table a little farther on. Fire lanes are the park’s old firefighting-access roads, and most repay a walk in some small way; this one mostly repays curiosity. The only people who’ll come looking are completists ticking off every spur, or a runner already down here who wants to say they ran it. Everyone else: at the junction, keep straight for the table and let 13A stay a dead end.