Leon Turnbull Photography

I didn’t get out shooting this weekend. It didn’t rain enough here to get the waterfalls going again. We were supposed to get a big dump here (up to 2 inches of rain, and plenty of snow in the mountains), but it was a complete bust. Perhaps other areas of California got some of the much needed rain, but we didn’t get much of anything here.

I decided to stay inside and work on my waterfallswest website instead. I’m in the process of adding some cool new features to the site, using Google Maps. The maps are already up on the site, so you can check them out now and give me feedback to if you like. I’m still adding more features to the maps, including hiking routes for all the waterfalls, and overlayed county lines on the regional maps. Some of these are done now, but there is plenty of work to do to get all of them added. And in the long range future (3 months or so down the road), I am planning to include my entire California waterfall database on-line (this includes all falls in CA, even those I have not been to). This will be quite impressive, I think you will agree once you see it.
This is a Western Meadowlark, a pretty little thing I saw along the auto tour route at the Sacramento National Wildlife Refuge.

This is the first of seven significant waterfalls along the beautiful Canyon Creek Trail. This one drops 42 ft., and it is a beauty. When it is really flowing well, it has a second chute that is really cool looking. But when I was here last weekend, the creek was definitely on the low side, unfortunately. Every time I come here, I think to myself, I gotta get down to the bottom of this waterfall. But every time, I don’t try it because of time; I don’t want to miss out on the many other waterfalls just downstream from here. Well, maybe next time.

One of my favorite trails in the greater Sacramento area is the Canyon Creek Trail at Gold Run. Waterfalls abound along this trail; in fact there are seven significant waterfalls on this trail which drops very steeply down to the North Fork American River. The biggest and best one is this beauty, towering 134 ft. high.

It is extremely difficult to find and follow this trail down Canyon Creek. It is so difficult that I’m amazed I ever found it to begin with, a few years ago. I have gotten temporarily lost on this trail as well in the past. This past weekend, I was anxious to get back here to these waterfalls because I have not been there in a couple years. I was pleased to see BLM signs at the trailhead and along the trail. There has been private land concerns here in the past, which is why I don’t post directions on my website. I am pretty sure though, that the trail still does cross private land. It would be nice if all of this trail became public land. It would be a mighty shame if this trail gets closed in the future because of private land issues. It is certainly one of the jewels of the Gold Country.

When I got down to the waterfalls, I was rather disappointed with the amount of water flowing in Canyon Creek. This creek normally has a lot of flow in it, and these waterfalls can be just amazing. I knew that they would not be roaring this day. But with last week’s rain, I thought they would be a lot better than they were. They were still nice of course, and I really enjoyed myself down at the bottom of the big waterfall. The big waterfall is no picnic to find either, as it is tucked back in the canyon well out of view, and well off trail. I owe a lot of thanks to the late Russell Towle, who was the person who helped me find these fabulous waterfalls years ago.

The steep trail follows Canyon Creek all the way down to the river, and I would’ve loved to go all the way down. But, unfortunately, I had prior commitments and had no time to do that. So after enjoying the 134 foot beauty, I headed back on up the trail. I hope to return here again soon. That is, of course, if we get any more rain this winter.

After visiting Little Roaring Creek Falls, my wife and I went down the road to Roaring Creek Falls. Little Roaring Creek Falls is bigger than Roaring Creek Falls, but Roaring Creek Falls is (or can be) a lot more roaring. But not today. The unfortunate problem with this waterfall is that it is situated below a hydro facility which diverts a lot of water from the creek. But when it has been raining very hard, there can still be huge amounts of water flowing in the creek.There hasn’t really been enough rain yet this year, though the waterfall is still a nice one, dropping 57 ft. along the creek.

Getting to the waterfall is a bit tricky as there are steep cliffs all around the falls. You wouldn’t want to slip and fall, that’s for sure. When I was here a couple years ago, I noticed animal bones scattered around the ledge area where I was photographing. It seemed to me this might be a dining area for the local cougar. This time around, I did not notice any new bones here, but I did see the same animal jawbone that I saw a couple years ago, from possibly a deer. Perhaps the cougar has moved on to other waterfalls. If you come here though, don’t go looking for the jawbone. It is not there any longer. My wife scoffed it.

Oh yeah, one more thing. My dog and wife each managed to collect quite a few ticks here (fortunately, she didn’t get any bites). Presumably, they were sitting in a nest of them while I was photographing the falls (or something). I didn’t get any ticks on myself. I was actually more worried about touching the poison oak. But I guess I managed to avoid that as well. Lucky me. My wife, however, was not so lucky. Not only did she get ticks, she got a bad case of poison oak, and not to mention a really bad cold on top of that. Whoops. I guess I’ll be sleeping on the couch for awhile. 😉

This past weekend was my wife’s and my birthday weekend. Our birthdays are one day apart in January (kinda cool, eh). Well, we were up north visiting the in-laws for the weekend, and since it was scheduled to rain, I thought it would be fun if my wife and I went on a waterfall hike together without the kids. How romantic is that? Okay okay, I know it is not romantic. I should have arranged some nice dinner out or some weekend get away for just the two of us. But hey, I really wanted to go waterfall hunting this weekend. And really, my wife rarely gets to go hiking with me, so I thought this would be a good chance for the two of us to go out together and have some fun. Did I convince any of you that this was a good idea? Or all you are sure now that I am just totally un-romantic? In my defense, my wife said afterwards that she had a fun time hiking with me.

Anyway, onto the waterfall. Little Roaring Creek Falls was the first one we went to. This is one of my favourite waterfalls in all of northern California. And it is one of the tallest waterfalls in the north state (97 ft. high). And it is drop dead gorgeous too. And not too many people know how to get to it. Heck, even I don’t know how to get to it properly, and I have been here three times now. The first time, I went the very long and strenuous way, which involved a difficult bushwhack up the creek through all sorts of brush and poison oak. Last year, I found an easier way, but took a wrong turn and still ended up having to do some serious bushwhacking to get up to it. This year, I was sure I knew how to get to it properly. But we still ended up doing some unnecessary bush whacking. Maybe next year I’ll get it right. Who knows.

It is a very beautiful waterfall and very refreshing standing right up next to it. It is a bit difficult to photograph especially if there is a lot of spray. But when it is really roaring, it is a spectacle to behold. I do hope we get a lot more rain this year. We sure need it, and I’d love to come back here again when it is over flowing.