Leon Turnbull Photography

I went back to Codfish Falls this weekend hoping to find some new waterfalls and hoping the creeks would still be flowing well after the rains of a couple weeks ago. Nada to both.

I did shoot one new-ish waterfall, that being Jefferson Canyon Falls which is right beside the road. But it was not flowing very well and I was quite bummed about that, so I probably won’t share that photo, but I do have it on my website here.

I was happy to see that the State Parks removed the stupid pay kiosk here. It was so stupid to have to pay $10 to go on a one mile hike, especially considering how bloody awful the road is down here. If I’m going to pay that much for parking they sure as heck better fix the stupid road (did I mentione it was stupid). Maybe someone at the State Parks finally wised up. Or maybe they just took the kiosk out for the winter. I sure hope it is the first thing and not the second thing. I also hope they removed the kiosks at the other places where there should not be any (like Knickerbocker, and the Confluence).

It is an easy hike out to Codfish Falls and I arrived early, before the sun got to it. The creek was flowing ok but not as strong as I expected. More rain please!

I didn’t really have any desire to return to Codfish Falls, but I wanted to explore further upstream, thinking there might be another waterfall up there somewhere. So after shooting Codfish Falls, I went up to the top. There is a trail up there, and surprisingly it continues all the way up the canyon. The bad thing, however, is that it is completely overgrown with poison oak. The oak was unavoidable. I made sure to scrub down when I got home, but I am sure hoping I do not get the dreaded rash. I went all the way to Little Codfish Creek, and beyond that until I got to the place where I thought there might be a waterfall. No waterfall was found, except for a five footer. I thought about continuing further, but I also kinda wanted to see if I could get up Little Codfish Creek because I think there might be a waterfall on that creek as well. Unfortunately, there is no trail up that canyon, and it just had far too much poison oak to make an attempt, so I turned and went back down, but I really need to figure out a way to get up there. Someday.

This was a bit of a surprise and I was definitely happy to find this new waterfall. I was not sure there even would be another waterfall in Mexican Gulch; I suspected there might be one, but more often than not, I find nothing instead of something.

I almost found nothing again. I could see the top of the waterfall as I descended from the road down into the gully. As I got closer, I got a good look at it and realized it was just a small, unworthy waterfall, only about 15 ft high at most. I was disappointed, thinking I had struck out yet again. At that point, I almost went back up the hill. It would be pointless to continue, however, at the last moment, I decided to descend all the way to the creek to get one more look at it from below. It was not difficult to go down, and if it was difficult I certainly would not have continued any further. When I reached the creek I was in for a big surprise. There was a lower tier that I could not see from above. This totally changed the dynamics of this waterfall. What at first seemed to be a small, boring, unworthy 15 ft. waterfall, now became a very pretty, two tiered waterfall, 25 ft. in height. Awesome! The Madman strikes again.

This waterfall would be quite amazing at high flows I am sure. Mexican Gulch is a small stream, but I really thought it would be flowing much better than it was. I certainly would like to return here at some point, when I know the creek will be rushing very strong. If we ever get out of this drought, that is.

P.S. I now have a SUBSCRIBE button for my blog on the left side. You can now keep up to date with all my blog posts.

Here is a new waterfall for you and me. But is it a surprise? Certainly it is not an unknown waterfall. It is located right beside the road on the way down to the ever popular Devil’s Falls. But I had never before stopped to photograph it, or even consider it as being a worthy waterfall. At least to say, I have only once before been down this way when it is flowing well, and that was many many years ago. It is on a very small drainage and needs a lot of rain to be flowing well, and usually if it has rained a lot, I have many other places to attend to, I never go down to Devil’s Falls area. But it does in fact qualify as a worthy waterfall for my website. You may have not considered it before if you have seen it, but it is actually on a named stream (Quail Trap Ravine), and is certainly over 20 ft high (it is 40 ft high), and it does flow throughout the winter season (though it does need much rain to flow well).

So anyway with all that in hand, I wanted to make a point to get a good photograph of the waterfall when it was flowing well. This weekend seemed like a prime time to do so.

It is a crazy, narrow, steep road down to Devil’s Falls, with humongous dropoffs. I hate it. There is no where to park at Quail Ravine at all, so I parked back up the road and walked down to it. It is not a particularly photogenic waterfall, and it could have used a bit more flow. The upper section, however, seemed a bit more photogenic from roadside. But could I climb up to it? As I examined the ascent up the rocks, it seemed to me quite possible. To go up. But coming back down would be another matter entirely. What the hey. I went up. I took my photos of the photogenic section of the falls. I turned around. I thought I might be trapped up there forever like a quail in Quail Trap Ravine, or die trying to get back down. I am kidding, but it definitely was tricky getting back down, and I had to use my rope to make the descent safely. No problem though.

On to the next waterfall. I did find a second new waterfall as well, which was more of a surprise find. It was not one I knew about, only suspected of its existence, but not overly confident of said existence. Well it does exist, and I will share the details very soon. It definitely made me a happy camper to find another new waterfall in the area.

I then made a stop at Devil’s Falls before I headed back up the crazy narrow hill. Devil’s was flowing very well. The rain in the past week has been very good. Folsom Lake has risen from 30 percent to 37 percent with the latest series of storms, but the real bad news is the snow pack, which currently is at only 15 percent of normal, and only one month left in the snow season. Even if we get a couple more big storms, we are still going to be in a terrible struggle to get through the summer.

Down at Yankee Jim’s bridge, it was a madhouse. This location is a prime takeout and put in spot for kayakers on the North Fork American River, and it seems every kayaker and their dog was out on this day. As I crossed the bridge, a slow car cut in front of me with a trailer of kayaks and headed up the hill. Although it is steep and narrow, there are plenty of spots to pull over to let someone pass. Is it not common courtesy to pull over when you are going very slow with a trailer and someone obviously faster than you is behind you? I mean geepers, come on, just have some courtesy eh. Darn kayakers, how rude. Ok, end rant. Carry on.

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.