Leon Turnbull Photography

We were off to Grandmother’s house for the longish weekend, but first off we would stop for a hike in the woods at Lassen NP and this time my daughter Nekoda wanted to come with me. The traffic was horrible on this weekend and it took much longer than expected to drive up north. In addition, I came across an unusually large number of incredibly rude drivers. If you are going to drive slow why are you staying in the passing lane? And then you get upset with me or block me if I want to pass you? What the h-e-double-hockey-sticks is wrong with you? Last time I checked you do not own the road. (Of course when I say “you” I am sure I am not referring to you the reader of this blog).

Anyway, sorry about that little rant. It was already after 7PM when we started the hike at the Lassen trailhead. That would give us precious little time to get up to the waterfall and back before dark.

The temperature was very cool. Considering it was over 100° in the valley, I expected it to be a lot warmer at Lassen. I knew it would be cooler than 100 degrees of course, but I thought it would still be quite warm in the mountains and the mosquitoes would be out, however it was cool enough that I had to wear a jacket, and the mosquitoes? None to be seen.

I wore my knee brace for the first time in a long time, to give support to my painful knee. It worked all right. There were a couple times I turned it the wrong way, and experienced searing pain for the mistake, but mostly it was good. This was a fairly easy hike but it felt good, and now I was not too worried about the big hike coming up. One thing I was worried about was the snow. There was still a lot of snow starting at 6800 feet elevation and increasing much more as we climbed up. By about 7200 feet, the trail was 100% under the snow cover and pretty much impossible to follow. There were a couple times it took a while to figure out what direction to go, and I wondered if we would even make it up to the falls. My next hike would be at a higher elevation than this.

The snow was hard packed and it was easy and fun to work on. You just have to be careful not to step in any big holes. There were a few of those. You could break a leg if you stepped in one. We were careful, though, and we had a lot of fun. Nekoda really enjoyed this snow walking. I told her that this is basically what I’ve been doing all spring so far.

In addition to the snow, there also were the creek crossings. The first one was a doozy. The creek was rushing very fast. We were able to jump across it on the rocks, but we still did get wet feet in the process. Nekoda has much shorter legs than I do, obviously, and I was concerned. It was a pretty big jump. She did it perfectly. This is the stream coming from Forest Lake, the same stream that the waterfall would be on – sort of. Sort of not though, exactly. Anyway, it made me think that the waterfall should be fantastic.

But it was not to be fantastic. The falls were flowing all right but not nearly as much as I thought they would be. In fact, I do not think this one ever really has great flow. Anyway, it was nice enough. I had to wade across the main stream to get up close to it, and it was quite deep and mushy. Nekoda waited for me on the dry side while I went to take photographs.

After taking the pictures, we had very little time to get down the mountain before dark. We hurried down as quickly as possible over the snow, over the river, through the woods,  and just made it back to the car when it was getting dark. Then it was off to Grandmother’s house we go. It was a lovely evening at Lassen NP.

 

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In the Stanley Cup hockey playoffs, players frequently keep playing when they are injured (assuming the injury is not too horribly serious – like a broken leg). The Stanley Cup is that important to them and their team. They can heal later over the summer. I do not watch too much of other sports, though perhaps this happens in other sports as well, but not in baseball – if a player sprains their pinky finger in baseball, they are out of the lineup for at least 4 weeks. With the big snowpack, this year is my Stanley Cup playoffs. I have to keep playing (hiking), even if I am injured – assuming the injury is not a broken leg. Well guess what? I am injured. It started with a mysterious pain in my arm last week – which is no big deal for hiking. Now it has spread to my leg. If I twist or turn the leg in a certain way, the pain is horrific and I am on the floor, howling in agony. Well don’t turn it that way you fool! I have no idea what it is or how it started. I don’t think I did it hiking or at the gym but maybe it is from that, but if it does not get better soon, I may have to go to the doctor. If this was last year, perhaps I would be resting for a few weeks. Not this year though, I have to keep on playing. I can heal in the Fall. I have a big huge and epic hike planned for this coming weekend. Let’s just pray I make it up the mountain and back down again.

Getting back to last weekend before my leg pain started … when I studied Google Earth in this area of the Potholes, I realized there was a second waterfall just a bit downstream from the popular upper Potholes. The upper Potholes may be well known and very popular, but who knew about these lower falls? It looked easy enough to get to, so off I went after photographing the upper falls.

It was a short jaunt downstream, hopping along the granite rock. The last part was a bit steep, but not too difficult. Clearly people have been down here, judging by the man-made rock cairns – unless they were bear-made. I did distinctly smell an animal as I descended. Is there a lion watching me from somewhere? I saw nothing. I suppose the cairns were likely man-made, nonetheless, I think the vast majority of people who go to the upper Potholes have no clue there is another waterfall downstream. This one is smaller, 27 ft. high, but still quite a pretty waterfall, especially with the high flow in the river. There was far too much mist right at river level, so I stepped back a bit, and changed my composition.

I thought I would have quite a bit of time before the sun came up, yet there I could see it starting to pop up over the horizon, just above the waterfall. It is rare that I get lighting conditions like this, and I took advantage of it, stopping down my aperture to create a sunstar effect, and waiting out the perfect light. I took quite a few photos, but this was the best one. I like it.

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I have now officially hit my goal weight, down 20 pounds since October. This is officially the lowest weight I have been in 18 years! (since I got married in 1999). Well, I do not know exactly what I weighed back then, but I’m pretty sure it was about the same as I am now. I am also in the best shape I have been in since those days, and my incessantly bad back is healthy too. When you get to the point I am now, exercise is an addiction. You want to exercise, keep going, get even stronger, get in even better shape. I haven’t felt this good in 18 years health-wise. My highest weight was around 230 pounds or so, although it has been quite a few years since I was that high. Now I am 175. I don’t need to lose any more but I need to keep going, cuz I don’t want to gain anything back, and I need to stay in this good shape. You can do it too! It is a lot of hard work, and especially so in the beginning, but keep at it. There will be potholes but it will get better. You will do it.

Anyhow, what about waterfalls this past weekend?

When it is over 100° in the valley, it is hard to get up for hiking. Even in the mountains, it is going to be too hot to hike. Oh yeah, and there are the mosquitoes also. But this year, we have the extraordinary snow pack, and the waterfalls are going to be flowing all year long. I need, I must, I will, get out to hike at least once every week. No matter what the temperature is in the valley. So say we all.

Even if it is just a short hike, I still need to get out and do it, and that is what I wanted to do this week, a short hike to a new waterfall. Thanks to a friend of waterfallswest, I learned about this waterfall at Silver Lake called the Potholes. It looked to be pretty nice, and I have never known about these waterfalls before now, so I wanted to get up there and check it out this weekend.

I checked earlier in the week for the status of the Mormon Emigrant Road and found that it was still closed. Jeepers, it is almost the end of June. This is one of those roads that should be plowed, at very least in the spring (like they do on other roads such as Tioga). Why don’t they?? The road closed meant I would have to go the long way around to Silver Lake. It is not that much longer, but it is definitely a longer drive. I checked one last time on Friday morning, it was still closed. But then, on Friday night just before I went to bed, I got a Facebook notification saying that the road was now open! (you see, Facebook “is” good for something). Praise the Lord! Now I could take the shorter Mormon Emigrant route on Saturday morning. I was not the first to drive the road this year, but I’m pretty sure I was the first to drive it on Saturday morning. (at 4:30AM!)  There was still snow along the side of the road at the far end, but the road was all clear. No damage from the winter. No potholes.

Once at Silver Lake, it is a very short and easy hike down to the Potholes. It is also fun walking along the granite rock. In the summer I guess this is a popular place to take a dip, but right now the river is raging. You won’t be taking a dip here for awhile. I measured the waterfall to be 37 feet high, and it is definitely an impressive one when the water is high like this. I can’t believe I have never been here before. What was I thinking?

But wait, there’s more…

 

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It was a much much warmer night compared to the previous night at Lord Meadow. My alarm did not go off for some unknown reason, and I wanted to get an early start, as I still had a big hike ahead. Also, I wanted to go back to the middle falls on Cherry Creek and photograph it. This was one waterfall I was not expecting on this trip. It is always nice to get a bonus waterfall. And it’s a good one too, about 40 ft. high.

It was a quick hike up to the falls. To get the best view of it, I had to cross part of the stream on Cherry Creek (not the huge and deep part of course). Not wanting to get my feet wet, I crawled out on a big log across the stream. I could not walk across it, so I had to scoot my butt along it. It was kinda funny looking. No one saw me. Not even the bears. Maybe a squirrel saw me, but I cannot be sure about that. Anyway, this got me into a much better angle to photograph the waterfall.

When I got back to the camp, it was still early. I packed up, ate breakfast, drank coffee, and relaxed a bit. Then I headed up the hill. It is a 1500 ft. climb to the top. When I came to the brushy section, I decided to stay more to the left of the stream. There were rock cairns here, and I assumed this was the proper way up instead of through the brushy part. At first it seemed a good route, and not too brushy. Near the top, however, I lost the rock cairns. Where did they go? Back through the brush? I decided to keep going straight up. It was much steeper, and a little brushy but far better than going back to the other side of the stream. I was concerned, though, that I might get blocked out by a cliff, or too much brush above me. Then what would I do? I’d have to go all the way back down. That would suck.

I pushed up ahead. I made it all the way up to the top above the brushy section, and eventually up to the trail again. From here it is downhill all the way back to the car and trailhead, but it is still 9 miles away. I felt really good in the beginning, and was ahead of schedule, but before long I started to become quite tired. It was a very hot day. My feet were hurting. I had to keep on going. It is a long road home.

Surprisingly, I happened upon some rangers who were doing trail maintenance work, clearing out trees on the trail. Overall, this trail is in bad condition. Many fallen trees on the trail, and a lot of brush. I do not think it has been maintained in many years. Thus it was quite a surprise seeing anyone up here, and so far up the trail. They were at least 7 miles from the dam. I made sure to thank them for clearing the trail. Although, it would not help me at all as it seemed they were just getting started. At least I hope that was it because I still encountered a heckuva lot of brush and fallen trees on the way down.

One of them asked if I had my wilderness permit, and he also asked me if I had packed out all my trash. Okay, I can understand asking about my permit, but asking if I packed out my trash is insulting. Clearly, I am a responsible backpacker and pack out my trash. Don’t all backpackers do that? I asked him in return if he wanted to see my dirty toilet paper. I was joking of course. I’m kinda glad I said it though, after that insulting question.

I wondered if the rangers had driven up the closed road and parked at the usual trailhead. I could not imagine they would hike 7 miles up the trail from the dam to do maintenance work. I was betting they had driven up the closed road. Perhaps they left their vehicle unlocked with the keys in the car, and I could steal it and drive back to the dam, saving me 4.5 miles of hiking. It would serve them right for insulting me. I’m kidding. However, I was very tired and delusional. Who knows what I would really do. It did not matter. I did not see their vehicle at the normal trailhead. I did not see their vehicle at the dam either. Perhaps they had driven partway up the closed road to where it was damaged badly (supposedly).

The last half mile walking along the dam seemed to take forever with the heat beating down on my poor head. Finally I made it to my car. I soaked my head with water. Then I made the long drive home, but of course stopped at Pizza Factory in Groveland first. I sure needed that.

 

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It was a very cold night, much colder than the first night. I’m sure it was below 32 degrees. The little streams and puddles were all frozen in the morning. I survived. I was wrapped up in all the clothes I brought with me and snuggled deep in my bag.

After breakfast I packed up and headed up the mountain. I thought I made great time. I was following my tracks in the snow from the previous day and it was quite easy. Yet it still took two hours to climb to the top (3 miles, and only about 800 feet ). Really!?!? It should not have taken so long. Where did the time go? I wondered how long did it take me to go down to the bottom the day before because surely it was much longer.

I saw many animal tracks in the snow. All fresh. Coyote. Deer. Mountain Lion. On Styx pass, I saw a lot of big cat tracks . He must live up there. It figures that is where the Lion would live. In Hell. I did not see him though.

I did see a truckload of bear tracks, more so than any other animal. They were all over the place, even at my campsite (not a place you want to see bear tracks). I wondered if I would see one. They can’t be too far off, some of these tracks are very fresh. Indeed, as I descended down the gully (off trail) to my next campsite, in fact I did see one. A big brown colored bear. A grizzly bear. No, not a grizzly bear. There are none of those in California, but it was a big brown one. He was right in my path just wandering about in the middle of the day. I gave him a wide berth and thus ended up going through more brush than I desired, but better that than bumping into the big guy.

There is a lot of brush on this big 1500 ft descent, especially in one particular cliffy area. It was not anything short of awful. I came close to turning around but kept on. After getting through the brush, I had to descend straight down a creek bed at one point, going down steep scary granite at another. I finally got to the bottom.

Spectacular!

The campsite is right at the bottom of a stunning 50 ft waterfall. It doesn’t get any better than this.
I think the site is called the Flintstones due to rock tables and chairs in the camping area supposedly, but I did not see this. I was not impressed by the reasoning around the name of the place but anyway, it is an awesome spot.

After dinner I tried to get up to Cherry Bomb Falls but I could not do it. I thought it would be easy, but I could see no way to get up above the ridge in order to get to the Cherry Bomb Falls. Others have done it but how? Did they cross the river? It would seem to be the only possible way to get up, and I do think the proper route is to cross the river, but clearly that was not possible on this day.  I was bummed. This was the main reason I came down here, to see this particular waterfall.

Will I try another year? Perhaps but I just don’t know at this point. It is a bit beyond my comfort zone. At least I found a couple nice waterfalls down here, including this beauty at the campsite. It was not a big loss at all.

 

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