Solving the Mystery of Coalca Landing (Abandoned Oregon State Park)
Solving the Mystery of Coalca Landing (Abandoned Oregon State Park)
Hidden on the banks of the Oregon’s Willamette River is a state park forgotten to time. This documentary attempts to solve the mystery of this obscure place by exploring its history and piecing together the reasons for its closure.
Chapters:
0:00 – Intro
2:12 – Coalca’s Pillar
5:34 – The Sawmill & the Railroad
8:58 – Willamette Greenway
12:33 – Early Years as a Park
15:00 – Fading Into Obscurity
18:08 – Parking Lot Closure
21:25 – River Access
24:11 – The Truth
27:26 – Epilogue & Credits
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This video is for educational purposes and is distributed for non-commercial use. It is not monetized or sponsored. All video footage, images and audio recordings are the property of their original owners and are used in accordance with Fair Use principles. If ads appear on this video, it means a piece of media was copyright-claimed; this ad revenue is collected by the copyright holder and bypasses this channel entirely.
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Key links from the investigation:
Cyclotram 2012 blog post & photos
https://cyclotram.blogspot.com/2012/11/coalca-landing-expedition.html
Jayne Cravens 2011 photos
Usforestkeepers 2011 photos
Oregon Encyclopedia entry on Coalca’s Pillar
https://www.oregonencyclopedia.org/articles/coalcas-pillar/#.YXfJcJ7MKUk
Oregon State Parks
https://stateparks.oregon.gov/
Willamette Water Trail
Willamette Riverkeeper:
https://willamette-riverkeeper.org/
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Music:
“Sphinx” by David Celeste
“Love and Friendship” by David Celeste
“Of All Things” by Johannes Bornlöf & David Celeste
“Follow Hidden Paths” by David Celeste
“Eyecatcher” by Howard Harper-Barnes
“Innocent Games” by David Celeste
“Perennials Awaken” by Howard Harper-Barnes
“The Inspector” by David Celeste
“Portobello Road”
“Two As One”
https://open.spotify.com/track/5VRr7nsJydrd7tH07GXD7D?si=28e0541eda9043b6
Excellent.
Yeah – 🔥 "The Devil’s Foot Stool 🔥👏🏼 GET OUT THE TOILET PAPER 🔥👏🏼 … ✨🖕✨
I just asked my grandparents who lives in Canby if we’d ever been there. Apparently we had stopped serial times over the years when I was far younger on the way from Portland to grandparents house. When I asked his first response was “the entrance was someone’s driveway so it was hard to spot”
Excellent video/documentary!!
Your intro is great, just stopped the video a sec to say so. Can ‘t wait to see were the story will take me. Thank you for this video.
BIG FOOT INFESTATIONS
The river is hardly beautiful.
Ok fellow foamers, what is the unit at 0:45? I’m saying Gevo..
The coverage of your research and insights into Coalca Landing is well done and interesting, even to a non-resident who doesn’t have the wherewithal to visit. Thank you for taking the time to use your skills in this manner.
Great narration, investigation and research
I grew up in Canby and have lived there most of my life, and I never knew this park existed (I’m currently 26 years old). I knew about the rock formation at the top of the cliff side. My dad pointed it out to me as a kid and I’d always looked for it when I’d drive by during winter when the trees were bare.
In January of 2021, there was a nasty local ice storm that came through this area and tore trees and branches everywhere. ODOT went through that section of the highway afterwards and cut a bunch of the trees out that were damaged next to the rock formation. So it is much easier to see right now than I can ever remember.
As for the park, it’s certainly a cool bit of history. I wish there was signs and markers put up when it was still there so more people could’ve known about it.
It’s possible that there is an easement issue with the private driveway which had to be driven across to gain access to the park.
That was an excellent documentary on this park. Good job!
Watching this from N. Colorado (-3 degrees right now…) and want to say how much I enjoyed your research and video. Thank you very much.
It’s crazy I grew up 10 mins from this area and had no idea
They weren’t environmentalists so much as they were pro using that as an excuse to screw people out of their property.
Thank you! Great job!!!….
Thought it said "cloaca landing" at first.
I knew as soon as this started before you’d even mentioned native inhabitants that it was going to be part of the story. That whole area was majorly important to them. They find artifacts all over that area even in Oregon city when they do construction. I bet the illegal activities were surfacing and digging for artifacts. No doubt
I have lived in Oregon all my life and never heard of this place thank u for sharing
It would have been amazing to have a beautiful Greenway from Eugene to Portland… So sad how industrial farming is destroying that part of Oregon now .. and now Oregon has this insane thoroughfare called i-5 going through the center… Oregon’s quality of life is declining in a major way…. Money money money… Oregon is becoming one corporation selling off all of it’s natural resources and fencing in all the beautiful places .. what Oregon is becoming isn’t what was intended but what do you expect with a state created solely for white people?
I was really, really hoping this would be a story about a Sasquatch attack shrouded in mystery and only spoken of in hushed voices by old timers.
Just visit it and film it yourself and post on youtube its a public place its legal
Very interesting detailed video, and well presented. Just i felt this whole question could have been answered by contacting Oregon State Parks? I dont understand the long winded work around this
Awesome, Obama & Biden made sure that funding was redirected from national parks to their own pockets. What a surprise…
I have a feeling that the housing issues in Portland and the number of people living in vans and R|Vs would have made the Coalca Landing Car Park a magnet this activity.
Headline from local Portland News Paper:
"Hundreds of Portlanders Are Living in Their Cars. Here’s How They Do It.
Even as the numbers keep growing, Portland and Multnomah County officials have repeatedly failed to create a program or location where people living in vehicles can legally park overnight."
Thank you so much, Peter, for this fascinating documentary! I appreciate your zeal and tenacity in investigating hard-to-find historical documentation to piece together the story. I think this kind of "obscure history" has a wide appeal, and I am glad I "accidentally" found this (YouTube recommendation). You do a fantastic job with your narration script, your due-diligence in citing the references, and in your video editing skills. I am curious: what video editing software do you use? I am genuinely interested in improving my own skills (at this time I am a novice), and I saved this video as an example of smooth, imaginitive, and thorough video editing. Once again, I thank you for creating this video, and I hope to hear from you with information about how you edited and produced this excellent video!
Don’t know why I’m stuck watching this but here I am
The closure of the parking lot was due to railway and hwy 99 traffic/parking lot interfacing decided by oregon DOT.
Basically a vehicular safety issue.
Dyslexics be like, "Cloaca Landing? What a ridiculous name!" 🤣
We are so spoiled with such incredible beauty in this country. The park and its history are so interesting and majestic but it’s an insignificant drop in the bucket compared to the nearby beauty. Awesome doc really shows how fast nature will reclaim. No trace of the foundry that was once there and soon there will be no trace of that parking lot. Thanks for the video.
I just found this you tube and I loved learning this.
I find remote history like this fascinating!
Thank you so much for this! I’ve driven by this old park a ton, back when I was commuting from Portland to Salem and now that I live in Canby when I’m heading North. I wondered what the deal was with it, and couldn’t find much. Also nice to see info about the rock, which I’ve tried but failed to ever spot from the hwy.
I like watching videos on abandoned places. This video came up on suggested videos. I had never heard of an abandoned state park so wanted to check it out. You did a great job making a documentary on an interesting subject. I hate the lack of funding but great to hear the park may be reopened som day.
I lived nearby as a teenager 1969-1971 and visited Rock Island and Coalca Landing from the river, and sometimes on my motorbike. I always wanted to climb up to the balanced rock. Thanks for the great video. I spent time on the log rafts and heard the trains coupling at night.
My grandparents had to sell property along the Willamette River for the Greenway. This was the place they grew hay for the winter to feed the animals on the main place closer to Eugene. Selling really hindered their farm and they eventually had to sell it all.
The Elijah Bristow State Park on Hwy 58 (Willamette Hwy) is where their place was located. I remember many summer days playing with my cousin while my grandfather cut and bailed hay. We also had family picnics there.
Great video thank you !
Keep it the story quality 🙂
It’s a pity the plans of a contiguous corridor of public land along the river was never fully realized. It would have made the Willamette river a international destination for outdoor recreation, and have preserved a major lowland river to an unparalleled extent in Western OR/WA.
Great video! Love the history of it! Do you have any interest of finding out about Dalton Point on the Columbia? My husband I go there for agate hunting.
The idea of selling our parks to private owners is devastating as an American.
Blues
Well done
The Geocache owner most certainly edited the description a while after the cache was hidden to fit the new situation.
Anyways, great little documentary, I thoroughly enjoyed coming along for this mystery.
I believe there is a lot to the old myth about the man being turned to stone. The land may be cursed or could be something buried underground no one wants to mention. ust my take. Need to research the people who had interest in Coalca and start a new research.
Coalca Landing was open until around 2014 I lived just up the highway, my family and I went down to hang out at the river, the railroad has a siding at the entrance. When we got there, there were 16 teenagers stranded inside-the-park late at night and could not get back across the tracks to get home! Because of a stalled train. Shortly after that they closed the gate for good.
f you plan on heading up to Coalca’s Pillar be aware that in Spring, Summer and Fall there is a lot of poison oak.
I’m curious about Fredrick falls near gales creek. It was like multnomah falls for the early 1900s residents in Oregon. But it fell off the earth. They did find gold over there I wonder if that did it.
suggestion, investigate California’s private govt official only access, or by invitation, only accessed by helo. publicly funded by taxes, reserved by invite only as a secure site for ‘budget and policy formulation and strategy. Dare ya and wishing you will take the test.
Pieces have been connected. That’s why we need more historians. Story is very important for people to feel attached to where they are and also respect the sacred experiences of the ancestors.
Like most of the commentators here, Youtube algorithmic suggestion. Watched through the entire video and also watching Monk at the same time. For some reason I thought I watched this earlier, and that was Oregon volcano eruption, while I was searching for Sasquatch in Oregon during the eruption, lovely video, Thank you, 🙂