Leon Turnbull Photography

I bet you thought there were no waterfalls left flowing in California due to this nasty drought. Right? Well, besides a very select few such as Burney, Mossbrae, and McWay Falls that flow year round, most everything else is pretty much dry no doubt. But not this one.

The North Fork Stanislaus River is a controlled river flow, so I knew that it would be flowing well. The keepers of the water usually have this river flowing all summer long. So when the drought leaves everything else dry as a bone, coming here in the summer is a good option.

I had never been here before, however, and I had been putting it off for three years now. There were a multitude of reasons why I had not tried it before. Number one reason is the very long drive and the fact that I would have to get up at 3AM in order to be able to get down to the river in good lighting conditions. It is SOOOOOO DIFFICULT getting up that early in the summer time and I did not think I would make it this time either. In fact, I had turned off my alarm in the middle of the night, thinking I would skip it yet again. But at around 2:50AM, I was wakened due to my wife snoring. She is not a loud snorer (and she will tell you she does NOT snore – yeah right) but I need perfect quiet in order to fall to sleep. Well, I may as well get up and go, I thought.

I had known about the waterfalls on the North Fork Stanislaus River from the kayakers. The Devils Kitchen run is a popular one for them, so I am certainly not the first to document/discover these waterfalls. I had thought, though, that I might be the first to hike down to them. I certainly have never heard of anyone hiking down there before. So in a way this was another drawback for me. I was not sure if it would even be possible to hike down to the waterfall due to very steep terrain or thick brush. Even if I could get down to the river, would I be able to get any view of the waterfall? Also, I did not know exactly where the waterfall was on the river, though I had a good idea, and I also thought it might not even be 20 ft. high. A huge long drive and a big difficult hike for a 15 ft. waterfall? Not exactly something at the top of my list of things to do. But alas the stupid drought does not leave many other good options, so this one still seemed like a good plan to me.

There actually was a trail down to the river, so I suspect I am not the first to hike down there. Well, it is an extremely old trail, and very faint, too faint to even follow in a lot of places. It has certainly fallen into disrepute and probably not been used in a great many years. Except it IS still used … by bears. There was a very large amount of bear poop along the trail, and some of it was HUGE. Like so huge I think there must be grizzly bears down there or something. I cannot confirm that though. I did not see any. I did not see any black bears either. Just a heckuva lot of poopage.

Even though the trail was too faint to follow, the terrain was not too steep and not too brushy, so I was able to make it down to the river. From there I worked my way upstream and found this waterfall. The kayakers call it Portage 24, and I measured it to be 34 ft. high. I was very pleasantly surprised to find this beauty and to be able to get down to it without too much difficulty, and especially that it was bigger than 20 ft. high. There is another 25 footer shortly above this one, though not as nice, but I will share that photo later. The lighting was not very good for photos, however. Even though everything was in shade, the sun was getting ready to come up over the ridge in the distance, making everything a bit too bright. In another month or so, the sun would be at a much better orientation for morning photography, however, I am not sure it will be flowing in a month, as the water gurus will likely turn the tap off by then. It is a beautiful place, and I would like to go back someday, but the hike back up the mountain was killer, climbing 1500 ft. elevation back to the car. And then that long drive home. Whew!