Leon Turnbull Photography

The other day I made a quick trip over to Panther Creek Falls, near Pine Grove.  I discovered this waterfall last year, and although it is out in the middle of nowhere, it is also right beside the road, so it is not difficult to see.  But it is very difficult to get down to. The descent is very steep, and there is no trail, and there is a lot of poison oak. Buggers. The view from the creek level is partially obscured by tree branches as you can see. Due to the very steep terrain, I could not get in any better position to take a photo. Still, it is definitely worth the trip and making the descent to the creek.

I was also surprised to see the creek flowing so high. I was expecting the flow to be a lot less. It seems that the high flow is due to melting snow, as we have not had much precipitation in recent weeks. After a lot of rain in Nov/Dec, January has been very dry so far. Come on, let’s have some more rain please!

http://www.waterfallswest.com/waterfall.php?id=595

On Tuesday I ventured down the One Eye Creek trail to Rock Creek Falls. I have been to this waterfall before (when Rock Creek was in full flood stage), but I figured it was time for a return trip. Nothing fancy or new, just a nice hike to a nice waterfall. It is actually one of the best waterfalls in the greater Sacramento area. In terms of height, it is only a mere 17 ft. high. But in terms of width, it is about 100 ft. wide, and the creek just thunders off a rock ledge spanning the width of the entire creek (and in the winter, Rock Creek flows much more like a river than a creek).  It is certainly a spectacular waterfall.

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The bad news though first … the ticks are out already. I saw a few of them on my hike down to the creek, little ones just hanging off the grasses along the trail waiting for unsuspecting hikers. It is not good that they are prowling about in January already. I suspect it is going to be another very bad season for ticks this year, perhaps even worse than last year (and they were really bad last year). I hate these little buggers. I can handle the poison oak. But I cannot handle ticks. They totally horrify me (remember my hike down into Canyon Creek last year when I had about 50 of them attach themselves to me within a couple miles of hiking).

Anyway, other than seeing a few ticks (and a lot of poison oak), my hike was wonderful. Rock Creek was not in flood stage this year, but it was flowing quite strongly. I worked my way down to the base of the falls, and found it much easier to photograph when you are not being drenched with mist.

After shooting Rock Creek Falls, I continued on the trail downstream. Yes, there is a trail downstream. Although it is completely overgrown and abounding with poison oak, it is possible to follow it. I think it may go down to One Eye Creek (it is called the One Eye Creek trail, after all). I was hoping to get all the way to One Eye, but the trail comes to a crossing of Rock Creek, and I found it flowing just a little too strong and deep to cross. I probably could have done it, but decided to play it safe and not do it this time. I am not sure if the trail did continue on the other side, but I think another day I will be back there to see if I can get down to One Eye Creek.

http://www.waterfallswest.com/waterfall.php?id=515

Well we sure got dumped on this weekend. Lots of rain, and plenty of snow in the mountains (and it is still coming). I knew the waterfalls would be going crazy so I really wanted to get out. According to my weather reports, it looked like Monday might be the best day (it only said “showers”, not “rain”). That turned out to be quite wrong to say the least. It rained all morning long on Monday, and I got completely drenched hiking. Darn weather reports, anyway. You probably think I am a bit “squirrelly” to go out hiking in the rain, or if there is a possibility of rain. I suppose you would be right about that.

Anyway, I had a few different thoughts on where to go, but I decided on trying out a couple new ones in the Grass Valley area. This one here is Squirrel Creek Falls. As you can see, the waterfall is flowing pretty crazily. For most of the year this creek is dry, but after a lot of rain it gets going. And we had a lot of rain. And it was sure going.

The hike down to Squirrel Creek is pretty easy. It is actually private property, but it is open to the public for hikers and bikers (awesomeness). The road leads down to the bottom of the falls, where I found a lot of garbage (not so awesome). It is certainly a fabulous waterfall when it is flowing, and I measured it be 62 ft. high, but it was raining hard the entire time I was down there, and that makes it very difficult to take photos. I am not too happy with this one.  Oh well, perhaps I will just have to go back someday.

After shooting this, I ventured downstream. There is another waterfall on this creek far downstream. I wasn’t planning to try to get all the way down to it, but I was curious if there was a trail. There was a trail and I followed it for awhile. But it led right to a house. It was a newly built house, but there was no one around, and it was seriously out in the middle of nowhere. I could see NO roads going down to it at all. It seemed that they would have to hike into their house to get to it.  It was very strange. Anyway, I turned around here, and I’m not sure if I could have followed the trail more downstream or not. It might be something to try another day.

To see more information on this waterfall, including directions and maps, please see my website:
http://www.waterfallswest.com#recent

I was looking to go out on a hike before the huge storm (supposedly 5 inches of rain) expected this weekend. At first I was thinking I would go out Friday morning, but the weather forecast was saying the rain would already be started by then. Not that I do not like hiking in the rain. I do, and I am still thinking of going out in the rain this weekend (or at least, immediately after the storm). But it is difficult to photograph in the rain, so I wanted to go out before it all started. So Thursday afternoon seemed like a good choice.

I took my son Jadon along with me. Usually, he doesn’t like hiking with me, but this time he said yes. Awesome. My plan was to go to my favorite little waterfall in the greater Sacramento area: American Canyon Creek Falls. It is a moderate 4 mile hike, easy enough for Jadon as well.

As we started hiking down the trail, I could tell the creek was flowing high. Much higher than expected. This was before the big storm, which means after this weekend it will be craziness down here. But with a higher creek flow, that meant the creek crossings would be rather interesting. There are three creek crossings on this hike. The first two are in mellow sections of water, and usually you can easily rock hop across. For myself, I was able to do it without getting my feet wet, but I had to be careful because the rocks were wet and slippery. But for Jadon, it was a lot more difficult. But all this was perfectly fine for him. He just splashed through the water in his boots. I tried to help him across on the rocks so he wouldn’t need to get his feet wet, but he thought it was more fun to just splash across. The little bum.

The last creek crossing is right at the base of the falls. In order to actually see the waterfall, you need to cross the creek. But the creek was rushing a lot faster here, and it was much too dangerous for Jadon to cross here. So he had to settle for just seeing the very bottom of the waterfall, which was a bit disappointing. He waited for me while I crossed the creek to take some photos. It was very dicey for me to cross as well, and I thought about it quite awhile before picking my spot to cross extremely carefully. I made it. There is really only one vantage point and composition to shoot this waterfall, and it is a difficult position in terms of placing the tripod, and then standing up on the side of a rock outcrop on slippery rocks. My legs were shaking as I stood there taking my photos, and hoping they would not buckle under me completely. I only took two photos. I had wanted to take a longer exposure, but after two photos, I had enough.

Meanwhile, Jadon was waiting for me on the other side and yelling at me while I was taking the photos. I could not tell what he was saying over the roar of the water. When I got back to him, he told me he heard Indians, and then he heard a mountain lion sneaking up on him. How he could hear anything above the loud sound of the creek is rather interesting (especially a mountain lion!). He is such a silly boy sometimes.