Leon Turnbull Photography

On Father’s Day, I drove up to Bowman Lake in the evening. The Tahoe Natl. Forest website said the road was still closed due to snow. But they are always behind and never keep their site up to date. I thought I would try it anyway. And I was right in trying it. The road was free of snow and open all the way up to Bowman Lake. There were quite a few other people out making the drive up there as well. But no one was going where I was planning to go. Because no one even knows about it.

The outlet from Bowman Lake is Canyon Creek. It flows down down down into the South Yuba River. And it makes a few waterfalls along the way. Not too many people know about these waterfalls below Bowman Lake. But this one here, which I am calling Upper Canyon Creek Falls, is not too hard to get to. If you stop at Windy Point on the road up to Bowman Lake, you can get a grand vista of this canyon, and see the creek rushing hard down from Bowman Lake, zigging and zagging, and winding its way down the canyon. If you look straight across from this point, you will see the creek disappear into the trees, then turn back away from you. This is where the waterfall is. If the trees were not there, you could likely see the falls. But you can’t get down there from Windy Point. There is a huge cliff in the way. You need to hike down from the other side, starting nearer to Bowman Lake.

The hike begins on a logging road. It was hot and muggy. The mosquitoes were out in force. I had to put on bug juice for the first time this year. I hate that stuff! But I got some from REI that was deet free, and it seemed to work very well once I put it on. The bugs were staying away from me. It is a pretty easy hike down the logging road until you get near the waterfall. I could hear and see the falls from the road, but how to get down to it? I found an open area from the road and started going cross country. As I got closer to the creek, I could get a pretty good look at the falls. It was a nice one. But once down at the creek, I was still far away from it. I had to work my way up the creek to the falls. Things got a bit more difficult and brushy, but I managed to do it. Now I was close to the falls, but there was a big cliff in the way, as the creek drops into a narrow gorge, and you can not see the waterfall. The only way to see it would be from the middle of the creek. The creek was rushing much too fast to consider wading or crossing. But fortunately, there were some big rocks that protruded right out into the middle of the creek. I could hop out on these rocks into the middle to see the waterfall, and take my photos. If the creek was flowing any harder, these rocks would have been submerged and this would not have been possible. As it was, things were a bit dicey. I was getting splashed by the water, and every once in a while, more of the creek would splash over onto the rocks, and all the while the creek was raging past me. The really bad thing though is that I was downstream from the dam at Bowman Lake, and if they decided to let out more water from the dam, I would have been in serious trouble. But I knew that the outflow from the dam is very consistent and this scenario was highly unlikely. Anyway, it is definitely a very cool spot. And the waterfall is a very cool one. I measured it to be 44 ft. high. I was extremely happy to have found this on Father’s Day. A great day indeed.

On one evening at Disneyland we went to see the new World of Color show. It was an incredibly spectacular display of water, lights, and fire. It was also a madhouse.

This show was not organized very well in terms of traffic control. The best place (and really the only good place) to view it is from the front row. But they don’t open “the gates” until a couple hours before the event. Then it is a mad rush of people down to the viewing area. We had kids so we couldn’t just run down there like everyone else. Thus we couldn’t get a front row spot, so we settled on the second viewing area back from the front. The good thing about this spot is that we wouldn’t get wet by the water works from the show, and this allowed me to take pictures. But the bad thing is that we didn’t have a clear view of the show, and there were many people in front of us (and thus, in my pictures). If I were to go back for this show, I would definitely want to experience it from the front row. However, I don’t think it would be possible to take pictures from the front because you get completely drenched from there by the water.

The World of Color show is a very challenging thing to photograph. These shots were all hand held, in low light, with the light changing constantly from dark to bright to very bright. It was impossible to focus, or get any kind of consistent exposure. Nonetheless, I did have a few shots that turned out not too bad. These were my favorites.

On another note, please sign up for one of the new Waterfall Photography workshops I am offering this Fall. Sign up by July 31, and receive a free 20×30 print of your choice.

We just returned from a nice family vacation to Disneyland. It was an adventurous trip.

It started out the first day with a trip to the ER. For my daughter and myself at the same time. Nekoda just had a bad fever but my wife was worried about ear infection. She did not have that but did have a virus that needed antiobiotics to get rid of. As for me, well let’s just say it was nothing serious and I was able to walk around Disneyland for 4 days without too much pain. But it does mean that my backpacking trip to Yosemite next weekend will be canceled, and I will need to return to the doctor to get the problem taken care of. Bummer.

As for Disneyland, the kids (my wife included) had way too much fun. The weather was very nice (not too hot), and the crowds were quite manageable (surprisingly). We rode Pirates of the Caribbean about 7 times (well, my wife rode it 7 times). That is now Jadon and Nekoda’s favorite ride as well. We saw the fireworks show and the new World of Color shows (both very impressive). The best show I thought was the Abraham Lincoln show, which was incredibly inspiring (yet sad that so few people go to see that). My daughter was ecstatic because she got to meet a lot of the princesses. We stood in long lineups for her to do that, but seeing her face light up when she met them was incredibly priceless. I’m not sure who her favorite was (she loved ALL of them). Jadon even got to dance with Ariel in a show and that was too cool (that’s my boy!).

I took a lot of family pictures of course. I also tried to get some shots of some of the characters around Disneyland, and I am posting here a few of my favorites.

Back to Oregon again. This is 119 ft. high Kentucky Falls, which is found out in the middle of nowhere in Siuslaw National Forest, at the end of a 2 mile hike down the beautiful Kentucky Creek trail. Right beside this is North Fork Falls, which I posted earlier. Both waterfalls are very spectacular. Kentucky Falls was particularly difficult to photograph due to all the mist from the falls. But somehow this shot turned out not too bad.

I was recently reminded of something important for my photography. I had sold an image of a particular waterfall in which I had gone to an extra effort to get the better shot. Meaning … I was standing in the middle of the freezing cold and fast rushing creek when I took the photo of that waterfall. The client later remarked to me that she could truly appreciate the effort I made to get the shot (after she had hiked to the waterfall herself). That extra effort made a difference in that photo. Anyone could take a photo of that waterfall standing on the side of the stream, but it would not be very special. To take a special shot, to take a different and unique shot, you need to make the extra effort to get into a better position. I don’t mean a dangerous position, but I do mean getting wet (with waterfalls, especially). I have gotten away from making this extra effort lately. I’ve just been taking the standard shot. But since this client said this, I’ve been trying to get back to making this extra effort.

Bassi Falls is one waterfall where you really need to get wet in order to get a special shot. I did get wet to take this photo, and the water was indeed very freezing cold from the snow melt. I like shooting this falls just before sunset. There is a very short window of time right before sunset, where there is some very nice warm light shining on Bassi Falls. It is beautiful, but it is a short time and it is gone.

I took my family here one evening a few weeks ago. It is a fun and easy waterfall to go to. There were a lot of people here when we arrived, but by the time we left at around sunset, we were the only ones remaining … except for one other photographer (and as I found out later, he was one of my website contacts – small world).

It is also a monster right now (as a friend recently remarked to me). It is a very apt description of this incredible waterfall. At this time of year when the snow is melting, Bassi Falls is just amazing, powerful, and spectacular. I always try to get out here every spring, and it never fails to disappoint me. This year with the excessive snow pack, it may be the best I have ever seen it. This was taken a couple weeks ago, however, so I suspect it is substantially reduced in flow now that most of the snow has melted.