Leon Turnbull Photography

This was my favorite of the five waterfalls I found on Grayhorse Creek last weekend. It looks drop dead gorgeous in the snow, and is 66 feet high.

From the lower falls it is a steep and tough climb up the canyon, and the further I gained in elevation the more snow I found. By the time I got to the upper waterfalls, there was quite a lot of snow and ice in the creek, making for some gorgeous scenery. Strangely, I found an old sign on a tree near the upper Falls which said “State game refuge”. It is hard to imagine that anyone had ever been up so far in this remote canyon before, let alone would put a sign up here on a tree. Yet I did see an old Trail up here, following it here and there, so obviously people have been up here before at some point in the distant past, but it is not one that anyone likely knows about these days.

This beauty is not the biggest waterfall on the creek however. Just above this 66 foot falls is a massive waterfall, perhaps 400 feet high, not far off the magnitude of Horsetail Falls. The lower section is easily seen, but it gets very steep very quickly, and viewing this monster is going to be a challenge. It is one that is going to look a lot more impressive in the spring time and I will be back here then for sure, but I am not sure what kind of views I will get of it.

Well it was getting late in the day, the sun was out now, and I had to make my way back down the canyon and then back up to the car. I saw no one, absolutely no one the entire day. Even back at Hell Hole reservoir I saw no one, and no cars on the road either. It was not until I got back on the main highway to Georgetown, and hearing the song that came on, the first words of which Don Henley sings “nobody on the road”. Ironically, immediately after he says those words, I see the first car on the road. If you know which song that is without looking it up, then you are awesome and you get 10,000 points.

When I discovered this waterfall on Grayhorse Creek at Hell Hole Reservoir last spring, I could not get down to it because I was backpacking and did not have a rope with me. I thought it might be possible to get to it with a rope, so it was high on my list to return here. I made it just in time. One more storm and this area will be closed for the winter.

The forecast for the last storm was 4-8 inches at this elevation. I was definitely thinking it a good possibility that I would not make it there. Eight inches is about the limit for my SUV. My next vehicle is going to have much more clearance for sure, but it’ll be a few years before I can afford another one. I had hoped to be at the trailhead by 6AM, but the drive was very slow going due to the snow on the road, not to mention that it was very icy. Ending up in the ditch would not be a good idea. Or even worse, off a cliff. As it turned out, other cars had driven the road the day before, and there was only 4-5 inches of snow. So it was on the very low end of the forecast, which in a way is disappointing because we need that snow, but I might not have made it there if there was more than 8 inches of new snow. I arrived at the trailhead at 6:30AM, 30 minutes late. It was going to be a stretch to make it to the waterfall before the sun got to it. Well I had to try.

Off I trampled through 4 inches of snow, following deer tracks and coyote tracks. Those coyote tracks looked pretty darn fresh, I wondered if I was going to catch up to him or not. But alas, I saw nothing but a friendly squirrel (at least, I assume he was a friendly squirrel). It was a beautiful crisp morning, perfect for a snowy hike, and a pretty nice sunrise overlooking Hell Hole Reservoir with fresh snow on the mountains (I did stop to take a photo). Unfortunately, Hell Hole Reservoir is looking pretty sad, but we are still praying that will change this spring.

I reached the creek above the falls a bit after 8AM. It seemed to still be in shade, but not for much longer. I got out my rope to begin the descent, but it was snowy and icy, and felt much too dangerous, a lot more dangerous than my recent trip to Patterson Creek. Uh, what should I do. Well I thought, what if I went further downstream, and then came back to the falls along the creek bed. The water flow was much lower than in the spring, indeed I had thought it would be flowing a lot better after this recent storm. It was easy enough to get down to the creek downstream, no rope required, and then it was very simple to walk up the creek bed. I did not even get my feet wet. I got up to the waterfall, and it was spectacular, a lot bigger than I had previously estimated: 69 ft. high, just falling a foot short from the 70 ft. marker. The flow was low, but it was still gorgeous. It would certainly be amazing in the spring if you can get down to it. I was ecstatic to make it here, but it was still early, and I was hoping to find even more waterfalls on this creek. And indeed, I did. And they were even more amazing than this one. Come back soon to find out.

I know this is not a good photo, but it is the best I could muster up today.

I went back to the East Fork of the North Fork of the North Fork American River (EFNFNFAR) again this weekend, trying to get to that mischievous and elusive upper falls. I found it, however it was not exactly what I hoped for.

I left the dirt road and headed straight down to the river. I was pretty certain I could come out right at the base of the waterfall, and have a perfect view of this crazy thing. Not quite. The descent was very brushy, in particular near the top, but I persevered and got through the worst of it. Continuing on down down down, 700 ft. down. It was not too steep or cliffy, and I soon began to think my grandiose plan was going to be perfection again. Then I came to the last 100 ft. of the descent. Cliff. Cliff. Everywhere a cliff. I made my way a bit further downstream, and found a non cliffy descent, it was steep, but I made it all the way down to the river. When I got down to the river, I saw a tripod head laying there. Gee, I thought, someone was down here before and dropped their tripod head. That is not very good at all. I looked a bit closer … that sure looks very similar to mine. Umm, wait that is mine! Crashing through the trees down that steep terrain, it must have come off the tripod and rolled on down ahead of me. Dang, I could have easily lost this and not even had a clue.

All righty then. I scooped it up and screwed it back on the tripod (securely). Now I just needed to work my way upriver to the falls, I really thought I was going to make it without any difficulty. I was almost there. I came around a corner, face to face with a deep and large pool, followed by a 15 ft. cascade, cliffs on both side, and no way to get up past it. The main waterfall was just out of sight, above this little cascade and around the next corner. I was skumped. And I was so darn close.

Well I went back, and then climbed up the mountain the way I came. I tried to get over closer to the waterfall above it. Maybe I could at least get a good view of it. Well here it is, I found a view. I was literally hanging on the edge of the cliff, looking down at the falls. I could not find any good place (or any place at all) to put my tripod, so I had to take the photo hand held. Not very good, but what can you do. It does not look very big from the photo, but the waterfall is really 30 ft. high or even more (I could not get an official measurement either).

It is a nice one, but man oh man is it so darn elusive. And absolutely impossible to get to, unless you are going to rapel down the river from above the falls. As you can see, it looks like someone has actually done this, and they left their rope hanging beside the falls. That quite annoys me and is very irresponsible to leave your rope out in a pristine canyon, so that the next person to come here (ie. me) has to look at your ugly rope beside a beautiful waterfall. Leave no trace, people! End rant. End story.

Well I was definitely pleased and surprised to find this waterfall, but it wasn’t my plan. Let me please explain my dear readers. Why, of course, you say…

There is, I believe, a bigger waterfall on this river, above this one. It is the East Fork of the North Fork of the North Fork of the American River. Say that three times fast. Or try EFNFNFAR for short. I first learned about these waterfalls from the late Russell Towle. I did not see any photos from him, but he indicated this lower falls was 10-15 ft. high. Later on, a friend of waterfallswest also got down to the lower falls, and not the upper one, and he also is crazier than I am (you can take that as a complement, Joey). However, his photo and description also made it seem that the lower falls was only 15 ft. high at the very most. So in a nutshell, I figured I could either try to get to the upper falls in which there was a 95 percent chance that I would fail miserably, or I could go to the very small lower falls. Neither of which appealed to me, and so I just did not even bother.

Well so this weekend rolls around and I have nothing better to do, so I determined to give this one a go, but my plan was to try to make that 5 percent happen and get to the upper falls. To be sure, years ago I have tried this waterfall before, but my route at that time was faulty. This time, the route was golden. I was very pleasantly surprised when I got down to the river to find it flowing halfway decent. There was about an inch of rain a week ago, but that is not much considering the drought, and I expected the river to be all but a trickle. How awesome that I might actually get to see some water flowing over a waterfall today. Well as it turned out, my routed put me too far to the left, it was too cliffy further to the right, and thus I ended up coming all the way down to the river below the lower falls. I figured I would at least try to get up to that small one, if nothing else. I had to cross the river (which fortunately was easy to do so, and then waded up the river towards the falls). Then I saw it ahead of me.

Wow! What a surprise, what a beauty! It is not a piddly little 10-15 footer, but a very gorgeous 32 ft. high gem. Magnificent! The cliffs on both sides of the river were completely massive, in fact it was just a teensy bit scary standing in the pool below the falls with the massive cliff looming above me. What if a big old bear above decided to knock a nice big old rock onto my head. That would not be very fun. Anyway, it certainly is a surprisingly nice waterfall, and the emerald green water was amazing. Will I try that upper falls again someday? Absolutely, and if we don’t get rain anytime soon, maybe it won’t be too long in the future.

I tried a new hike this weekend and it was almost really great. That is, to hike up above Horsetail Falls in the Desolation Wilderness without actually hiking up Horsetail Falls. That could be a challenge, yes? But I hate, really hate, the route up alongside Horsetail Falls. Of course I have done it before many times, but it freaks me out now in my old age. So how can I get up to the amazing area above Horsetail Falls without going up Horsetail Falls? The answer: Rocky Canyon.

Rocky Canyon is a steeper route and more difficult, but not so crazy treacherous and dangerous. In fact, it is not dangerous at all. The only problem is the brush, the awful brush. Indeed, I almost turned back, but persevered and found the way through, and after that the rest of the hike was easy smeasy.

However, I arrived at my destination, Ropi Lake, much too late. According to my calculations, the waterfall still should’ve been in shade, but it was clearly not. This is the second time in a row that the Photographers Ephemeris program screwed me over. Has anyone else found issues with this program recently? Well, I’m sure it was user error, and I will not be making this mistake again (he says so confidently). The sun still should have been behind the ridge, but it was well above it, for at least an hour or more, and I was not that late in arriving. Anyhow, I climbed out on the very slippery and dangerous logs to get in the middle of the creek, in order to get this shot of the lower part of the falls, which is certainly not a particularly good one.

On the way back, I passed through a campsite. The backpackers were gone off on a day hike, I saw them heading in the direction of Pyramid Peak. What amused me about their camp site, was the way they hung their food. It was horrendous! The food was strapped on a rope over a branch, only a couple feet off the ground. It would not have been able to prevent squirrels from getting into it, let alone bears. Seriously, you may as well just lay out all your food on a table cloth complete with napkins and utensils for the bears. A royal feast for them I would say.

I did hike back down along Horsetail Falls. I have never had trouble before going down that route, only going up. I knew there was one sketchy section but I was certain that I would have no troubles getting down. But alas, I was wrong again. There were a couple other sketchy sections that I did not remember even seeing before. One of them in particular was pretty crazy to get down safely. It was also darn hard on my old knees. Well, I did make it down and all in one piece. I’m definitely not too excited about trying that again. I would definitely do the Rocky Canyon route again though, if I can figure out a way to get around that awful brush.