Leon Turnbull Photography

Well it’s not much, but this is what I got to this weekend. Yet I do think it would be very very pretty at higher flows, and I would not hesitate to return here in the future, if I know the creek is flowing well. This is East Panther Creek Falls, 25 ft. high.

The trip had a very shaky beginning to say the least. I was stopped for speeding. I was only going 15mph over the speed limit, and going down a hill. My big SUV picks up speed very quickly going down hills, and I do not like to press the brake so frequently. I had not been speeding on the drive thus far, but at this particular moment, I was not paying attention to my speed, and there he was waiting at the bottom of the hill. Dog-gone-it! When he took my license and registration back to his car, I started praying fervently. Please Lord, let this just be a warning, I cannot afford a big expense like this. Well in less than a minute, he came back to the car and told me he was just giving me a warning. Wow! How amazing is that! Thank you Lord, and thank you Officer! Now Lord, how about another miracle and please send us more rain next week! That was my next prayer. It is a bit interesting because two days ago, the weather forecasters were saying “increasing confidence” for us getting rain next week, and for the rest of the month as well. Then just yesterday I looked at the forecast and all the rain was completely gone from the forecast. Are you kidding me? I was totally depressed in seeing that Friday, and even more so as I headed out hiking Saturday morning. And yet, when I looked at the forecast Saturday afternoon? The rain is back in the forecast for next week! It doesn’t seem like it is going to be very much rain, but I hope this is another answer to prayer.

I anticipated there being quite a lot of snow at 6000 ft. when I started my hike. They had a foot or more of snow on the I-80 corridor last week, but down here the snow was all gone. It seemed like they got a lot less here, only about two inches or so, and most of it had melted. I should have checked this area before I came, but I did not think of doing so. Why would I think they had so much less snow in this area? Well I guess I wouldn’t need my snow shoes. As I hiked along, I first came to West Panther Creek, and it was barely a trickle. No snow to be found. East Panther Creek is about the same size drainage, so things were not looking very promising, yet when I arrived at that creek, I saw that it did have quite a bit more flow, and there was more snow around as well. It was not very great though, I was anticipating this creek to have a lot of snow melt happening today, and would be flowing quite well. Not even close.

I was not sure there was a waterfall on East Panther Creek, just hoping that I might find something. I started hiking up the canyon, and the going was very easy at first. Before long, however, the terrain got very brushy and much steeper, as the walls of the canyon closed in on me. I had to cross the creek multiple times, and climb up through the brush and through the creek to keep going forward. I somehow lost my bear spray along the way as I battled my way through the brush. I was going to look for it in earnest on the way back, but I decided to go a different route. Speaking of which … my wife just told me about a water bottle she forgot at a certain place and had a friend go pick it up for her, so she bought her flowers as a thank you. Really? A bouquet of flowers for a water bottle? The lady did not have to go out of her way at all to go get it. Geepers, that is too nice. Well … I guess what I am trying to say is that if you come up here and find my bear spray and return it to me then I will buy you a bouquet of flowers. Or if you’re a man, perhaps a case of beer would be a better option.

I finally made it up to where I thought there would be a waterfall, and voila, it’s a waterfall! It was 25 ft. high, just making it above my 20 ft. limit. And it was a pretty one. As I said, I really want to come back here when the flow is better, but coming up along the creek bed at high flows would not be do-able. I thought about it and decided it might be better to go back by climbing to the top of the ridge, hike back along the ridge, eventually getting back to where I started. No creek crossings necessary. And it worked pretty well. It did get a bit brushy, but all in all it was a much better route. I shall return.