Leon Turnbull Photography

It was a cold night. I had all my layers on but I slept fairly well.

Today’s hike would be about 11 miles. All on trail. Except …

The last 2 or 2.5 miles was absolutely ridiculous. The poison oak was atrocious. All over the trail. I brought a small saw with me to cut it back. I’m sure glad I brought this. It was about a half pound but worth its weight in gold. Nonetheless, even though I thought I avoided touching the stuff mostly, I still received a horrible rash for my efforts. It only takes a couple touches and you are done for. The ticks were atrocious. I probably plucked a hundred of the beasts off me. Only one small bite but man I hate those things. The trail was atrocious. Very overgrown and very difficult. There is one death defying rock slide you have to negotiate by climbing up the cliff (through poison oak of course). I honestly expected the trail to be much better and easier than it was.

These last couple miles to camp took a long time to hike. (two and a half hours). Last Chance camp is very small with only one tiny spot for a tent. It is surrounded by poison oak and to get to the creek you have to go through the oak. I was not impressed with it but there was no better place to camp and I was very tired.

In the evening I went up to the waterfall. This section was no better. Only a quarter mile away but it took a long time because it was so overgrown and difficult. Along the way I somehow lost my tripod. Argh! I retraced my steps EXACTLY and I could not find it. What the heck happened to it? The photo is hand held. It is not too bad but I was not happy about the tripod to say the least.

Last Chance Falls is 97 ft. high. It is a beautiful and magnificent drop, but I don’t think it was worth the effort to get here. Oak, ticks, overgrown trail, horrible rash, disappointing campsite, losing tripod, etc. Supposedly there is a trail to the bottom of the falls but I could not find it. It looked very steep and treacherous to get down to the bottom and I did not want to attempt it. The view from the trail would have to do.

The next day I walked all the way back to the car. It was 18 miles. A very long day but after the first climb out of the canyon it was mostly all downhill. When I got back to the campground I saw a lot of people and cars. Was the road now open? The road was NOT open. Yet people were just driving around the obvious and well signed closure. Rules don’t apply to some people, I guess. To be sure, there was no really good reason the road should have been closed – the workers had mostly fixed the washed out section (but that is no excuse for ignoring the rules). I got back to my car at about 4:30pm and made the long drive home. My back was not doing well at all but it was happy that I got to sleep in my own comfortable bed. It was a wild and vexing 3 days in Ventana Wilderness.

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Ventana Wilderness hikers are a different breed of human. They are immune to poison oak. Horrendous amounts of ticks and crazy bush whacking do not bother them. You have to respect that. Any of these three things and I would turn back. I am not worthy. But I keep going back to Ventana. There are many waterfalls there I still have not seen. I encountered all three of these nasties this time and I did not turn back. I probably should have, though.

I initially planned to do this trip a couple weeks back but I postponed it due to weather. That was smart because the rivers would have been twice as high two weeks ago. As it was they were barely crossable. The problem, however, was that I put my back out the weekend before my trip. I don’t know how. It has been fine for six months and then all of a sudden it goes out. By the time my trip was to start the back was still not healed but I was not going to delay my trip again. It was probably not a smart decision. Ventana or bust.

My planned hike was going to be a very difficult one. Most of it would be off trail with tons of elevation gain and loss, and plenty of difficult bush whacking. Also the road was closed about 4 miles before the trailhead due to a wash out. I parked beside the road and walked the 4 miles in to the trailhead, then continued on my planned route. The first part was on trail but I quickly realized this would not work. My back was starting to really hurt and I still had 2000 ft. of elevation to climb. All this before I even reached the off trail section. I knew I would not be able to make it so I decided to turn back. There was an easier hike I could go on instead which would be (mostly) all on trail. I think this was a smart choice although I really had hoped to do the harder hike this year. It was not to be.

This waterfall was found by a certain Ventana Wilderness expert and the location he gave was a mile or so down river from the trail (ie. off trail). HOWEVER … as I hiked down the trail to the river I passed by a waterfall. It looked exactly like the photo I had seen of this so called off trail waterfall. I was 95% sure it was the same waterfall. I took a photo (shown here). The location was not anywhere even close to the marked spot. Nonetheless, I decided to go down river anyway and check out the other location. At first it was not too bad. I had to cross the river 3 or 4 times. The water was up to my knees or thighs but it was easily crossable. I was about a quarter mile away when all of a sudden the route became extremely difficult. I should have turned around (because of my back), but I tried to press on anyway. Soon afterwards I came to a spot where I definitely could not continue. There is no way anyone could have gotten by this section. Could they? I retreated and found a spot to camp by the river. There was a turtle bathing on the rocks in the sun. I also saw plenty of lizards and newts. My back was not happy from that excursion. I set up camp, ate my dinner, and went to bed.

I will rename this waterfall Lost Valley Falls. It is 20 ft. high exactly. It is on an unnamed creek. The next day I would continue my trek, supposedly an easy hike on an easy trail to another beautiful waterfall. Yeah right, this is Ventana Wilderness. Nothing is easy. Stay tuned …

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As of April 1, the snow pack in California is at 190% of average (north), 233% (central), and 298% (south). Precipitation is at 133% (north), 184% (central), and 213% (south). April 1 marks the end of the winter season so anything we get from now on is bonus precipitation. I’m sure you are all hoping we don’t get any bonus precipitation. Now that it is spring it does not bother me that people say or complain they are done with the rain. I just don’t like it when people say that in winter (especially in a drought). As for me, I say let’s get on with spring already!

Saturday, April 1: I was wanting to go hiking in the snow this weekend so I had plans to do a couple hikes. The first hike I was expecting to be fairly easy with no snow. Ha! When I arrived at the trailhead I found snow on the road. Not too much. I decided to put on my snow boots instead of my hiking boots. Good choice. I also decided to leave my snowshoes in the car. Bad choice.

As I hiked down the road, downhill, losing elevation, the snow was getting deeper and deeper. This is illogical. There was now about 3 feet of snow. I was only at 3000 ft. elevation. I suppose I should have known better but I was not expecting so much snow here. It was too late to go back to the car to get snowshoes. Snowshoes would be nice. Fortunately I was not sinking in too much, just about 6 inches (mostly). As I continued, now climbing back up in elevation, the snow was about 4 or 5 feet deep. I started sinking in a lot more. About 12 inches. Now it was very tough going. The second hike was canceled. At least I am getting the snow hike that I wanted.

I hoped to see two waterfalls on this creek. I decided to go to the upper one first. That one should be easier. To get down to it you have to get off the road and descend the mountain down to the creek. It was steep. It was treacherous in the snow. I had to be very careful, taking just one step at a time. Near the bottom it got very cliffy. One wrong step and I would be toast. I could see the waterfall but I could not get to it. I also could not find any place to take a photo of it. I will have to return someday when there is no snow. Maybe then I can get to it.

Back up at the road, now I was quite tired. It was a cloudy day though so I figured I should try the second waterfall. I did not have much hope. I was certain the lower falls would be much steeper and cliffier than the upper falls. Also brushier. Well, the snow was a lot softer. I was sinking in a lot more, making it quite difficult, but it was not cliffy. I made it all the way down to the creek and up to the waterfall fairly easily. Middle Cherokee Creek Falls is a very pretty little thing, 27 ft. high.

I retreated back up to the road and hiked back to the car…

Then it happened…

I was attacked by a wild boar…

Well that has never happened before…

Okay okay, I was not actually attacked. However, it was huffing at me and was running towards me. I thought it was going to attack me. Then it stopped. Thankfully! At first I thought it was a bear because it was big and brown and huffing. Then I saw it was a boar, not a bear. I have not seen a wild boar before. I am not actually certain it was wild because there was private property in the area, but if it was tame then why would it attack me? I think I will just say it was wild. It sounds a lot better. My wife did not believe me when I told her this. She thought it was an April Fools joke. It certainly would be a good joke but it was real, believe me. And I have video proof of it. When I post my video of the hike in a few weeks then you can see and believe as well. Ha ha!

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When I was down at Paradise Canyon Falls in January I noticed a waterfall in the distance dropping into the river. I was certain that it must be the bottom of Mile Hill Creek. It looked to be a good decent drop and it looked like it would be pretty easy to get to by hiking along the river bed. A future return trip was inserted into my brain.

Fast forward to March. The rain continues. The creeks must be flowing as high as they were back in January. I thought. That return trip to Auburn was extracted from my brain. Here we go.

This time I found a good place to park for free. I was quite happy about that. It added about a mile round-trip to the hike. No problem. As I hiked down the trail I saw that all the little creeks were not flowing nearly so well as they were back in January. At least half as much flow. I was not so happy about that. Big problem. I got down to the river and started hiking along the river bed towards the waterfall. As I suspected it was very easy even though the river was extremely high. I easily made it to the waterfall. It was NOT Mile Hill Creek. It was in fact just one of the small unnamed creeks. One of those small creeks that had half as much flow as back in January. I was not very impressed. I did not really want to take a photo but decided to take one anyway to share with you. It will not likely be going on my website even though it is 24 ft. high. Continuing on to Mile Hill Creek was out of the question because of the cliffs so I retreated back to the trail and up to the car, arriving well before sunset. There was a couple standing around in the bushes. Not doing anything. Just standing there. What in the all out heck were they doing? So weird. Let’s go home.

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My hike last weekend was a bust. It was killer difficult and I almost bonked, but did I find a waterfall? No sir. You can’t always get what you want.

This weekend would be different. I needed a sure thing. Something that I knew I could get to. Something that I knew would be flowing decent. Something that I knew would be good. Enter East Fork Falls. Returning yet again to the East Fork of the North Fork of the North Fork American River. EFNFNFAR for short. Just go east, old man. I’ve been to East Fork Falls twice before, this would be the third time. I had hoped to get to a second waterfall as well, but that did not pan out. It took much too long to get down to the first waterfall and I was very tired by the end of it. I had no energy or time to go to the second waterfall. That’s all right. I’ll be back again.

There was a tiny bit of fresh snow on the ground when I started. The first storm of the season is underway. It is almost mid November. Another late start to the season, but much more to come in the near future. We hope. The overnight snow meant that all the brush was very wet, and of course the hike to East Fork Falls is off trail and through a lot of brush. My pants and boots were soaked by the time I got down to the river, but that wasn’t the big problem. Once down at the river, you need to cross it, and then wade up to the waterfall. Crossing the river was not difficult, but the water was cold! Then … when you get up to the waterfall, the best place to photograph it is accomplished by standing in the water! The freezing cold water. For a good 15  minutes or so! My feet were uncomfortably numb by the time I was finished. Dang!

Well, it was certainly worth it. East Fork Falls is an absolutely magnificent 32 ft. high waterfall dropping into a gorgeous emerald green pool, surrounded on all sides by massive cliffs. It is stunning. It was surely an amazing day in Tahoe National Forest.

 

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