Leon Turnbull Photography

With my wife and daughter in San Francisco this weekend for Nekoda’s dance seminar, I had Jadon with me at home. I was not really wanting to go out on a hike, but in the end decided to take him on an easy one up to Colfax. I made a bad choice though on the destination, Bear Falls.

My mistake was in thinking this was a natural waterfall, and thus it should have somewhat decent flow after the recent rains. When I was here in August it was flowing better than this. It seemed to me at that time that it was a natural waterfall and the creek flowed under the canal above it. Wrong. Upon further investigation, I now realize it is man-made, and the flow comes FROM the canal. And thus, even though it had rained recently, there was no flow coming out of the canal, resulting in a lame waterfall.

Ah well, at least I had a nice morning hike with Jadon. Afterwards, we went to Mormon Island at Folsom Lake. That was rather interesting, and even though the lake had risen 10 percent from the last storm, I was surprised to find it still accessible. That may change soon. It seems like we may be getting another big storm next week. Thank God for this! I will certainly be looking forward to hiking next weekend to a non-lame waterfall. Finally!

I did really want to see Bear Falls, however, at decent flow. Another time I guess.

Well last Thursday when I realized that the Pineapple Express was powering its juice in to northern California, and we were going to be getting 7 inches of rain, I knew that the waterfalls would be roaring. Monday looked like it was going to be the best waterfall day, so I promptly asked my boss for Monday off. I was set to rock and roll. Now we just needed the rain. And it came.

We actually received 12 inches of rain in the foothills. Folsom Lake rose from 17 percent to about 27 percent capacity, and we are still getting runoff from this storm and will be throughout the week. And don’t forget the five feet of snow that fell in the mountains, which will be coming down eventually. Of course we still need much more rain but it is not quite the bleak sham that the media has been reporting the last couple days.

On Sunday the North Fork American River was up to 10,000 cubic feet per second, and that means ALL the waterfalls would be flowing awesomely. On Monday morning I was off to see one of my favorites, 134 ft. high Canyon Creek Falls. The river flow was down to about 6000 cfs, which was about the same flow as when I visited it in Dec 2012. One of these days I want to see this waterfall at monster flow, but I’m still waiting for that chance.

When I left the house, it was raining and foggy. You may remember when I visited this waterfall last time, I experienced a small miracle. It was raining, foggy, and windy and as I hiked down to the waterfall that day, I did not even think I would get to see it because of the fog, or photograph it at all. So I prayed to God to stop the rain, fog, and wind, and as soon as I got to the waterfall viewpoint, all three were gone: no rain, no fog, no wind. It was certainly a miracle and blessing from God. Well it looked like the same thing might happen again this year. However, this year I DID NOT ask God to stop the rain. We need every ounce of rain we can get this year, and I really would not mind if it was raining when I got there. I did ask Him to take the fog away though, because it would really suck to hike all the way down there and not be able to see anything at all!

I arrived at the trailhead and found another car parked in my spot. It had Minnesota plates, which was strange. What person from Minnesota would be out here hiking to this waterfall so darn early in the morning! There is only one parking spot at the trailhead, so I had to drive a bit further back up the road. As I came back down to that car, I was video-taping with my Go Pro camera. When I got to the car, I stopped and was making commentary for my video, saying things like, you know, why are they parked in my spot, who would be crazy enough to be out here so early in the morning, that kind of thing. Ok well after doing that, I continued on down the trail. After only a short distance, I realized I forgot my umbrella back at the car, so… I decided to go back to get it because it was “supposed” to rain some more that morning. I got back to the car, and lo and behold, there was a man getting out of the car, and getting ready to hike. He was sleeping in the car! And I must have woken him with my crazy commentary! Oh my gosh. I apologized to him for waking him. He was very cool about it though, saying that he needed to get up anyway. He was an old miner dude who had a claim down by the river, and he was going down there to pan for some gold. Geez, talk about embarrassing. I had no idea anyone was sleeping in the car!

Well anyway, la la la, off I went down to the waterfall again. Well this year as I hiked down to the waterfall viewpoint, there was no rain. There was no wind. There was also no fog. I guess all of that is good stuff, except that the sun had come out! It was not supposed to be out until around noon, certainly not this early in the morning! If I had thought the sun would be out, I would have started my hike much sooner than I did, and it looked like the sun was shining right down in the canyon, right on the waterfall. So I prayed again, this time: please God, don’t let the sun be shining on the waterfall. Well I got to the waterfall viewpoint, the falls was thundering down the canyon, much the same as last time. It is an incredible waterfall, and the view is spectacular, with the thundering waterfall on one side, and the raging river on the other side. The sun was not exactly quite shining on the waterfall, but it was almost on it. However, the viewpoint was all in sun, and that made photographing the falls from there very difficult. I continued further down the trail looking for a different viewpoint that was not in the sun. All I found was poison oak. And a lot of it. You can continue quite a ways, perhaps getting all the way down to the bottom, but it seemed far too brushy to try it. I came back to the main viewpoint and stopped again before I headed back up the hill. Enter stage right: thick clouds covering up the sun. Sweet goodness! The clouds made the lighting much more pleasant, and I was actually able to take some decent photos of the waterfall. Once again, God answered my prayer here. He is surely awesome. And so is this waterfall.

Finally! It is raining! Woo hoo! The waterfall madman is a happy camper! At least for one weekend, anyway. Praise God for the rain, seriously. This weekend is the FIRST major storm we have had in 14 months. We have had a few small storms, but I don’t think we had anything in which we received over 2 feet of snow in the last 14 months. That is incredibly awful. Usually in every month of winter we get at least one if not more of these big storms. But we have one this weekend finally. Over six inches of rain is expected in the foothills, and up to 5 or 6 feet of snow in the mountains. Now that’s what I am talking about, but we really need so much more still, so keep praying.

Anyway, Saturday rolled around and rain or not, you know I am going to get out there. In fact, I love the rain. Bring it on! And it did come on!

But where should I go? I really had no good idea. I finally decided on going to Nevada City and Kenebec Creek Falls. I have been there before, but there are some other potential new waterfalls in the same area that I wanted to check out. I thought I would go to Kenebec first, then hit some of the new ones.

Well, it rained steadily the whole day. The lady at the gas station in Nevada City told me to stay dry. I told her I had plans to get very wet. I am not sure she believed me. But I sure did get wet. In fact, I would not have been more wet if I had swam across the South Yuba River in all my clothes! The rain also makes it quite difficult for photography. But I did not complain! No way, Jose. I am just so happy to see all this rain this weekend. Anyway, I had an umbrella and tried to manage to keep it over my camera while I took the photos. It worked all right.

Kenebec Creek Falls was not really flowing all that great. It is a very small creek, but I have seen it much better. Indeed, it probably will be much much better Sunday or Monday, and although I do plan to go out hiking again this weekend, it won’t be back to Kenebec. I had hoped though, that it would have more flow than it did. It probably rained about an inch or so in the area on Friday. It needs a lot more.

After shooting Kenebec Creek Falls,  I went over to the unnamed waterfall beside Kenebec. I was at this one before when it was flowing much better. I should have photographed it then. Today it was not quite flowing too well, but I took a photo anyway. Then I did something a bit crazy. I went for an additional 5 mile hike in the rain. By the time I was all done, I was a drenched rat. Literally. Everything was completely soaked through, including my waterproof boots and waterproof gloves. I followed the South Yuba trail over to North Canyon. I thought there “might be” a waterfall there, and I wanted to check it out. I figured I should do it now, because who knows when I will be back this way. Well, I did not quite find a waterfall. But oh it was oh so close. I found a little cascade, and it was close to 20 feet high (my lower limit) and perhaps was, but it just was not quite interesting enough. It was just a small cascade, but the biggest problem was it was not clean, there were just too many branches obstructing the view of it. It was not worthy. And that was just sad.

It was a long hike out there for nothing, and by the time I got back to the car, I was far too wet to try going anywhere else. The other ones will have to wait for another day, but at least I got one decent waterfall to see at Kenebec Creek. It was a fun and very wet day.

Here is the next Waterfall Madman episode. Please check it out!

Seven. That is the height of this new waterfall I found on upper Otter Creek. Give or take. It was a heck of a lot of work to get down here, and the poison oak was abundant. All for a seven foot high waterfall. But hey it was an interesting hike anyway.

I was certain that there would be at least a 25 footer on upper Otter Creek, or even more than that. My topo map shows a 50 ft. drop here, so I figured a good 25 foot drop would be a sure thing. Google Earth seems to show a possibility of a waterfall here as well. The problem, as I figured it, would be that it would be impossible to get down here. I had little hope of making it down due to the steep cliffy terrain, and the crazy brush. I decided to give it a shot anyway. Indeed, I almost did not make it due to the aforementioned crazy brush. Which, as you may think, was crazy thick near the top of the canyon. I could not find any way through the stuff, and in fact, had given up and was on my way back to the road when I saw a gully that was clear. I decided to head down the gully. It worked. It was quite steep but it was a decent path and free of the brush. Not free of poison oak. That was crazy too. It was strange but it seemed people had been down this path before. Way out here in the boony docks? Who would even think of going down here except me? And why? There also were a lot of bear trails crossing the gully here and there on the way down. Where were they heading to?

I made it all the way down to the creek, then realized the “waterfall” was quite a bit downstream from where I ended up at the bottom of the gully. There was a lot more poison oak to negotiate (unsuccessfully, I might add) but I managed to work my way all the way downstream, and what did I find? A 50 foot waterfall? No, just a couple very small ones, both under 10 feet. Ugh! All that work for nothing?? Well, I took a picture of one of them anyway, then made my way back to the gully and back up the mountain. It was tough going. The good news about it is that my back held up very well from this crazy hike. Even though it was just a tiny waterfall, I still enjoyed the hike. I love exploring new places, and being out in the wilderness where few people have ever been before. When I was down in the canyon, I felt so remote and alone. It was a great feeling. It would have been awesome though with a bigger waterfall.

New Year’s Day … Get up and get at ’em … That’s what I say … No sleeping in for this party maniac. Ha ha.

Yeah folks, I was in bed at 9PM on New Year’s Eve. I don’t care squat about staying up for the end of year. It’s just another day to me. But if I have a day off work, I want to get out and go hiking. That’s how I roll, man.

With the lack of rain and how utterly and inhumanely dry it has been, you may wonder why I would even bother. Well heck, it is my favorite time of year to get out hiking. I am not going to let the STUPID weather keep me from doing what I love to do. Besides, waterfalls are still flowing. You just need to pick the right spots to go to. If I had gone to, say, Traverse Creek or Dutch Creek, I would be sorely disappointed. But Silver Falls on Otter Creek is a much larger drainage, and it would still have some decent flow. So that is just where I went. And by golly of gollies, it was actually flowing, just like I said.

I was almost in Placerville before I realized I had forgotten my wallet and phone back at the house. Argh, my wife would be worried. I would not be able to send her any messages. Too late to turn back now. Let’s just hope I don’t put the car in the ditch out in the middle of nowhere.

The road out to the trailhead is rough rough rough. And muddy muddy muddy. With the no rain situation, you would think there would be no mud. Think again. When I was here last year, I had to stop because of a huge mud hole. The same mud hole was there today. I tested it, however, with my hiking pole, and determined I could continue driving through it this time. When I was here back in 2009, I don’t remember any mud holes on this road. The road seems to have gotten much worse over the years. Or else my memory much worse. You decide.

And now a new problem presented itself: the road was gated just before getting down to the trailhead with a large NO TRESPASSING sign. What the hey? This is a public road and a public historic trail. How can anyone put up a big gate preventing access to this public trail? It is totally illegal to do this. Not only this, it added a mile to my hike because I had to park further back. Argh! When I got back home, I checked my maps. To the best of my knowledge, it seems that the forest road briefly crosses private land just before it gets to the trailhead, and that is where the gate is, but the trail seems to be all on public land. Unbelievable. Totally illegal gate.

That gate was annoying but it sure is not going to stop me. Off I went down to the waterfall. The trail, though it is old, public, and historic, does not get very much traffic. It does have brush and poison oak overgrowing onto the trail, and a few fallen trees to negotiate. A few ticks as well. And mountain lions.

When I got down to the creek and started working my way up to the waterfall, I apparently found the local lions’ dinner spot. Bones scattered all over the place (deer bones, I think). And that means … it was either mountain lion or Sasquatch that was here enjoying the waterfall view while munching on a tasty snack or two. No sign of Mr. Cougar was to be had, and that was surely a good thing. I continued to the waterfall.

As you can see from the photo, Silver Falls was not raging by any means, but nor was it dry as many creeks are these days. In fact,  the flow was only slightly lower than when I was here last time, which was in January 2009. Pretty darn nice waterfall. Interesting to note also: that grate (or whatever it is) at the base of the fall was not here last time. Wonder how it got there. Weird.