About Our Chapter
The West Valley Chapter was formed in 1995 in McMinnville and includes membersfrom Amity, Carlton, Dallas, Dayton, Grand Ronde, Hillsboro, Lafayette, Newberg, Salem, Sheridan, Sherwood, Tigard, Tualatin, Willamina and Yamhill and Idaho! Please
know that OET members can attend any/all chapter meetings and we all welcome visitors!
We meet the first Thursday of each month at the American Legion Hall, 126 NE Atlantic St., McMinnville, OR at 7pm with a no-host dinner starting at 6. We have a lighthearted but organized meeting, sometimes with a guest speaker. We plan work parties, trail rides and campouts. At certain events we have potlucks and share an awesome appreciation for cooking and eating. Our September meeting usually includes our horses and is held at the wonderful Perrydale Trails. Our December meeting is disguised as a Holiday party with food and a gift exchange/toy drive donation.
Please join us! Our members include a variety of folks- most have horses but not all, most ride but not all, some like to come to meetings and others work behind the scenes on committees and projects, some just want to contribute to our efforts at maintaining and upgrading trails and horse camps. If you are looking for new friends to ride with, clear trails, improve your trailering safety skills, or get/share a good dutch oven recipe, we are your people!
Chapter Officers
- Chapter Chair: Melissa McLaughlin westvalley@oregonequestriantrails.org
- Vice Chair: Sharon Wilde
- Secretary: Cheyenne Craig
- Treasurer: Richard Grabill
- Field Service: Jim Werth
Chapter Resources
Chapter Facebook PageWhat’s Happening
Chapter Projects:
West Valley has 3 main riding and camping places that we have adopted for many years-
- Sheep Springs Horse Camp and trails in the Deschutes National Forest – After many years of repairing winter damage on the wooden corrals, in 2023 we completed the conversion from wood to metal corrals. This was a nearly $100,000 project funded with OET grant funds, Visit Central Oregon, USFS and GoFundMe. Our members, friends and Central Oregon Chapter OET provided the labor, which now can be directed to clearing the surrounding trails. In Spring of 2024 we used OET grant money to hire the Youth Corp to clear 10 miles of the Metolius-Windigo trail from camp to Bear Valley. Annually, in the spring we lay down fresh gravel in the horse pens and tidy up the camp area before it opens for the season.
- Nehalem Bay State Park Horse Camp – Also in 2023 we completed a multi-year project of converting wooden corrals to metal, and increased 4 corrals to hold 4 horses instead of just 2. We partnered with Oregon State Parks, Boy Scouts, OET Grant Fund and our wonderful volunteers to make this happen!
- Upper Nestucca Trailhead, West of Carlton – This hidden gem of a trail is 17 miles west of Carlton on land that we lease from the Oregon Department of State Lands for public use. We have created a trail system on these 80 acres with a map posted at the parking lot/trailhead. A large tract of multi-user trails are adjacent.
Chapter Photos
Click on a photo to start the slide show and see captions.
