Leon Turnbull Photography

I love it when my birthday is on a Saturday. Saturday is my usual hiking day, so when my birthday is on a Saturday, I can hike all day and do what I love. Find waterfalls!

I headed back to Oroville. This time I left very early, and beat the construction traffic on Hwy 70. They were getting ready to start at 7AM when I drove through, but there were no delays. My plan was to head back to Murphy Creek Falls and try to get to that elusive upper falls. However … the creek was at about twice the flow it was last time I was here. I would have to cross that creek. I suspected this would be the case as I have been monitoring creek levels all week. It did not go down as much during the week as much as I had hoped, but I decided to try it anyhow. The creek actually looked crossable when I arrived at the trailhead. This might be good after all. I started up the trail, but then got to the small seasonal creek just before the lower falls. This little creek was flowing at least twice as high perhaps more. It was extremely dangerous, and I could not cross it safely.  I did not want to die, so I retreated back to the car. That is when I found a yellow sticker on my car from the highway patrol (not a ticket). I was parked legally, well off the highway, and gone for less than 30 minutes. Yet the officer apparently thought I had abandoned my car! Geepers!

Anyhow, Murphy was a bust. It was on to plan B.

Plan B was to go up to Chambers Creek Falls. I have not been to these falls in 12 years. It was time to return and get better photos of these waterfalls, and maybe see some parts I have seen before. I started the hike at 11:30am. So what was I doing from 8AM or so until 11:30? Going to see other waterfalls of course. All in all, I saw 7 waterfalls on my birthday, 3 of them were new ones. More on this later.

The hike up to Chambers Creek Falls is a huffer, gaining 1700 ft. in elevation in a couple miles. There were a ton of ticks along the trail. Crappers. Fortunately, the trail is wide, so it is easy to avoid them. As I thought about this, however, the trail suddenly becomes much narrower on the top half of the trail. Not so easy to avoid them now. But anyhow, I avoided getting any of the little bugger machines on myself. I find it interesting how they know to climb up on the grasses overhanging onto the trail? They do not climb up on the grasses off in the bushes. You need to do a lot of off trail scrambling to see all the waterfalls up here, and I did not see any ticks (or very few) when I was doing all that.

I finally arrived at the bridge over Chambers Creek. There are four waterfalls here. Only Fall #2 is easy to get to. The other three are killer. I ate my lunch at the bridge, and took photos of #2 (35 ft. high). As I was finishing up my lunch, a family came up the trail. The only other people I saw all day long. I don’t imagine they were planning to see the other waterfalls (which is good because they had two little kids and a dog and that would have been very dangerous for them – but those kids did really good climbing up this trail, it is not an easy hike). Anyway, I climbed up above the second falls, and then down to Fall #1 (105 ft. high). After this, I climbed back up and down to the trail, and made the very steep descent down to Fall #3 pictured here (94 ft. high). I was standing on a freaky ledge at the edge of the cliff to get this photo. I sure hoped the rock was secure on the cliff. But Fall #4 was scarier. I have not been down to Fall #4 before, and I did not think it would be possible. Yet I was able to continue climbing down the mountain, and I came down to a point where I could see Fall #4. Sort of. It was almost but not quite the most spectacular thing I have ever seen. You can get a glimpse of the 2 tiers of Fall #4, with #3 above. What a sight. But it is only a glimpse. There is no clear view of the thing. As it was, I had to stand in a very sketchy spot, just to get a photo of Fall #4. After this, it was back up up up to the bridge, and then back down the trail to the car. I got back to the car right at sunset. Then I drove to Chicago Fire in Roseville to meet my family for my birthday dinner. It was an awesome birthday.

 

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I have lost faith. Not in God. He has always been faithful. I have lost faith in humanity. Although, to be honest, I think I lost faith in humanity years ago.

I have been horribly upset with what has happened during the government shutdown in the national parks. They have kept the parks open during this shutdown, which I really liked at first. Last time, they were completely closed, which greatly upset me. I expected there not to be any problems (silly me). I mean, come on! The national forests are not patrolled by rangers, and there are no problems with them. Yes, people do litter and such. However, mostly, it is not too bad. But with the national parks? It is like people have literally lost their brains: Litter left everywhere (where wild animals can get into), pooping on the side of roads, driving snowmobiles illegally to the top of Lassen Peak, vandalism, cutting down rare trees, blazing roads where there should not be any roads. You can’t take out your trash? You have a car! You can’t bury your poop? You should have known before you even entered the park the restrooms were not being maintained and you should have been prepared for that! You have to vandalize precious places just because the government is shutdown and you think you won’t get caught? I can’t even comprehend that! I would like to think that 100% of my readers would never do any of these things, but if there is someone out there reading this that is guilty … why would you do this??? Please let us all take responsibility for our actions.

Well enough of that crap (literally), now let’s get to the topic of the Camp Fire … I drove through the area for the first time this weekend, where the fire started, along Highway 70 north of Oroville. As you would expect, the devastation was intense. It was absolutely awful. I was not hiking in the burn zone, I was just driving through it. Unfortunately, the traffic was also awful because of the construction and cleanup, and there were many road delays. I do not know why I did not think that they would be doing cleanup and that there would not be any delays, but alas, it did not occur to me. Well that was dumb. It took an extra hour to drive through the area.

I finally arrived at my hiking destination: Murphy Creek Falls. This is the second time I have come here. It is a short hike up to the first waterfall (pictured here). The flow in the creek was good, and again it was extremely tricky crossing the small stream just before you reach the waterfall. One slip here and you are toasted, down and out over a waterfall. I did actually slip in the stream. But smartly, I was using my rope to cross for safety and I caught myself before disaster struck. I took my photos of the first waterfall.

Next I wanted to try to get up to the second waterfall but unfortunately, I ran out of time. There is a decent trail up the mountain and I followed it. I was kinda surprised to find a trail here, actually. However, it did not go to the second waterfall. It continued up the mountain above the upper falls. It  made sense to continue following the trail. By the time I realized this was the wrong way, it was too late. I came to a dead end. I could see the waterfall but the view was obscured and it was not worth taking a photo. It was now almost dark, and I had to retreat back down the mountain. If I had not made that wrong turn and if there were no traffic delays, I probably would have had another hour of time and could have made it to the falls. I will have to come back up here another time. The sooner the better. I arrived back at the car just before dark. The workers were done for the day, and there was no delays driving back home. It was a nice hike to a beautiful waterfall in Plumas National Forest.

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Who’s the madman? Yes, that is me. Who can find hidden waterfalls in the middle of nowhere that no one else has been to? Me, again. Well, I can’t quite take full credit on this one. It was waterfallswest friend Trailscout that found this on Google Earth, and told me about this falls on Lost Creek, though she has not been to it yet. How did I miss this one in my study? I scoured Google Earth and the USGS Topo Maps in this area, but somehow missed it, but it was there and it sure looked like a good one on GE. I had planned to go in the spring, but with the recent rain and before too much snow fell, it seemed like now would be as good a time as any.

It is a very long drive out here. Basically, you drive to the end of the world, then go a little further, and then get out of your car and hike another 4 miles. I probably could have driven some of those 4 miles, but there was a bit of snow and I felt like hiking anyway.

Thankfully, I fixed my GPS. I was going to order a cheap SD card just to see if that was the problem (before buying a new GPS), and when I looked at the picture of the SD card on-line, I saw a “lock” switch on it. I thought to myself, “no way”. I took out my old SD card and looked at it, and saw that it was in the lock position! This is why the GPS could not write any data to the card! I flicked the switch, and voila! The GPS and card are now working fine. It makes no sense, however, because I NEVER take the card out of the GPS, so how could the switch possibly have been changed?!?! Little gremlins ?

It is a good thing it is working now, otherwise I would have been completely lost. I started down the road and realized I needed to turn off down another drainage and road. Except there was no road! There was a very overgrown drainage that there is no way I could have navigated down. Looking at my map, I saw another possible road to take. It would add about 1.5 miles (1 way) to the hike, but I thought I had plenty of time so off I went. At first, this other road was very overgrown, with many fallen logs. I was about to turn back, then I noticed a light at the end of the tunnel, and the road opened up. From there on it was easy. Until, that is, I came to the end of the road, just above the waterfall.

It is a steep descent from here, there is no trail, and a lot of brush (but no poison oak!). You are descending down to the creek beside a seasonal stream, which had a little bit of flow. Thankfully, not much flow because there was one little section where I had to go down right in the middle of the stream, because it was too steep on both sides of it. The only way to continue was to go right down the stream bed. It was very slippery and I had to be extremely careful. It was short, though, and once I got by the steep sections, I was able to get all the way down to the main creek. The waterfall was out of sight and around the corner. I could not even hear it yet. In order to see it, I had to cross the creek. I was able to rock hop across it, but it was difficult, and the rocks were very icy and slippery. I made it across, then I climbed up the icy rocks and logs on the other side, then across a sketchy talus slide, and there it was! An incredibly gorgeous 38 ft. high falls dropping into a magnificent emerald green pool. I was lost in another world. Such beauty. Such allure. Such grace. And who has ever seen this one or heard about this one before?

For more info on this waterfall, see my website:
https://www.waterfallswest.com/index.php#recent

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Another rainy day in Paradise! Not Paradise the town. (close to it). A brand new spectacular waterfall discovery! Who could ask for anything more! It was a fantastic day for the madman.

I was not sure where to hike this weekend. It looked to be very rainy on Saturday around where I live. But the forecast said there would not be much (if any) rain in Oroville on Saturday morning, and it would be clearing. Yeah right.

So off to Oroville I went. It was raining there. Surprise surprise.

I was looking for a brand new waterfall, and this one was way out in the boondocks. A very long drive. Almost all the way out to Seven Falls. In fact, I was hoping to do a couple hikes this morning. After this first one, which should be easy, I would then hike down to Seven Falls, which I have not been to in a long time. I figured this first one would be an hour in, and then an hour back. So I should have plenty of time for Seven Falls, however it was actually two hours in and two back. It was 11:30 when I got back to the car. It was too late to go to Seven Falls. The sun was out by then. Not to mention I was very tired, and very wet.

Yes it was raining. And even snowing off and on. There was a bit of snow on the road at 4000 ft. elevation. Not too much, just a little. Just enough to make sure I drove slowly and carefully, as it was quite slushy on the roads. There was even a little snow down at the waterfall (as you can see).

My GPS stopped working. I’m not sure what happened, but it would not write or format the SD card. I tried another card as well, so I don’t know what the issue is, but I am bummed. My GPS is very reliable, and I really love it. For this hike, I loaded my maps onto my iPhone and Gaia GPS app. It worked very well, but I don’t trust the phone to the same level of reliability and now I have no backup. You may think: what do you need a GPS for anyway? Well, you can say that if you are always hiking on a trail. But if you are hiking in the woods, with no trail, in steep canyons, and not following any significant landmarks (such as a creek), a GPS is an absolute necessity. How are you going to find your way out of that canyon? Even if I am on trail, I like my GPS for a couple reasons: I like to see exactly where I am and how far I have to go, plus I upload my GPS tracks to my website so my customers (you!) can download into your own GPS.

Anyhow, back to the hike. I was 95% sure there was a waterfall on this creek, but I could not confirm it on Google Earth. No one else has ever been here and documented this waterfall. So I had to check it out on my own. How should I go there? It looked less brushy on the north side, but then I would have to cross the river, which I may or may not be able to do, especially after all this rain. On the south side, it looked steep and brushy. There was a trail shown on the USGS topo maps, and I found it, sort of. It started out fairly well, but shortly into the hike it became pretty much overgrown and not much of a trail at all. Mostly, I was just hiking through the woods. It was not really that brushy, except for a couple spots. And it was not too steep until I got down to the creek. And bonus: there was no poison oak! Considering it is very close to Seven Falls (which is abundant with oak), and about the same elevation, this was a big and very welcome surprise.

I got down to the falls, I could see it, but how could I get up to it? There were very steep dropoffs into the creek. The ground was slick and wet. Nonetheless, I made my way down to the creek, and then up to the falls without too much trouble. I had to get right in the creek and up on some rocks to get a good view of it, a gorgeous 43 ft. high cascade. It was still raining, but I did a better job taking photos of this one (just a little better). On the way back up the mountain, the sun started to come out, but I was a wet sloppy dog (again!) by the time I got back to my car.

Please see my website if you want to know more about this waterfall:
http://waterfallswest.com/#recent

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It was a stressful week, and I was so very much looking forward to getting out for an overnight backpack trip on Mount Shasta on Labor Day weekend. But where would I go? Could I even do it? The smoke from fires has been particularly bad up north. Would it be too unhealthy to hike? Would the creeks on Shasta even be flowing? I had no idea. I called the Ranger station in Mt Shasta. They had no idea. Isn’t it their job to know these things?

It has not been hot enough recently. Yes, you heard me correctly. July was hot. The first part of August was hot. But the last couple weeks have been very cool. Too cool in fact. The glaciers on Shasta would not be melting very much right now. Thus I was concerned that the waterfalls would not be flowing any more for this year.

As I drove north and passed Redding, all of a sudden the smoke in the sky became horrendous. This was from the Hirz Fire. The sky was ominous. I could see the orange glow from the fire above the mountains to the east. If it was this bad at Shasta, I could forget about hiking. However, as I got closer to Shasta, the smoke dissipated and the sky became much clearer. Things were looking up. But what about the creeks? I stopped at the Whitney Creek crossing along the highway to check it out. The creek was flowing. Not super great mind you, but it was flowing. It was early morning, so it would be much better in the afternoon also. But if there is water at the Whitney Creek crossing, does that mean Bolam Creek will be flowing also? Or just Whitney? (the two creeks join together before the highway) I have seen Bolam completely dry when Whitney flows. And I have seen Bolam flowing well when Whitney is just a trickle. So what would it be like today? The only way to find this out is to hike all the way up to Bolam Creek as I had originally planned.

I have hiked up to Bolam Creek Falls before, but did not get to the upper or middle falls. It was a killer hike just to the lower falls, and I had no energy or time to continue up the mountain. This time around, I planned a different route. A much easier route, and I would be camping at Bolam Creek as well. I would have plenty of time. It was going to be glorious.

It was a beautiful day. I was feeling so refreshed as I started this hike, but my pack was very heavy. I was carrying 3 1/2 L of water, which should be enough (hopefully) to get me up there and back. I was not certain what the water situation would be up at Bolam Creek or if it would even be flowing, or if it was flowing could I even get down to it? If you look at Google Earth it does not look possible to get down to creek level. The canyon is seriously steep. So that meant I had better take enough water with me to be safe and not sorry.

The trail starts out well for the first 3 1/2 miles. It is well-traveled and a gentle grade, climbing up 1500 feet of elevation. 99% of the people using this trail are summiting Mount Shasta or trying to anyway. But not me. I am looking for waterfalls. So when the trail ends at the point where the climbers go upwards and onwards, I needed to go cross country over to Bolam creek. It was fairly easy going.

The geology on this side of Mount Shasta is fascinating. I crossed over a number of very old and very dry drainages. These are not marked on any maps. They looked to be volcanic, or glacial, or both. At least a couple for certain were obviously glacial. Glaciers that have long since disappeared, probably hundreds of years before USGS made its topographic maps. It seems to me that some people forget that glaciers have been melting pretty much continually since the last ice age, thousands of years ago. If they are continually melting, then they will eventually all disappear, right? Are they melting faster now? Perhaps they are, but it should not be a surprise to anyone that glaciers are melting. On Mount Shasta, the Coquette Creek drainage is dead (very sadly). I declared it dead two years ago after I came up to visit Bolam Falls. I do not think this waterfall has flowed significantly or at all in over 10 years. What a shame. However, it is not surprising. There is not enough glacier above to melt into this drainage anymore. I would pay a lot of money to travel back in time and see Coquette Falls flowing as it once did. But the Bolam Creek drainage still flows.

I descended down into the Coquette drainage, the first real steep section of my hike (which I would have to come back up the next day), crossed it at the dry waterfall and made my way over to Upper Bolam Creek Falls. There was a perfect campsite right beside the waterfall viewpoint, with a view of Mount Shasta and the waterfall in one shot. What a perfect place. I was so happy. I set up camp, had my dinner, then decided what to do next. I had thoughts of crossing over Bolam Creek to Whitney Creek, but I could see no way across. The canyon was crazy steep on both sides. I decided to just stay at Bolam and I’m glad I did.

In the evening I went down or tried to get down the Coquette drainage to get to the base of Bolam Falls, but it was too steep, the ground was very unstable and crumbly. Nonetheless, I did find a path over to it, after I had almost given up. It was awesome to be up close to this marvelous 80 ft. high waterfall (pictured here above). After this I climbed back up, got down to the middle falls (which was crazy steep and dangerous- but I managed), and then photographed the upper Falls from top of the ridge.

I was now down to a half liter of water. I still had found no way to get down to the creek level at any place. The creek was also flowing incredibly dirty and it was not really drinkable. So what would I do? A half liter would not get me back to my car. I went to sleep, very dirty, and very tired. In the morning I decided I’d have to get down to the creek. I found a way, and filtered some water. The creek flow was much lower in the morning, and also a lot cleaner as well. Now I had plenty, and even enough to enjoy a cup of coffee with my breakfast. It was a beautiful morning, and I was feeling terrific. After breakfast, I packed up the gear and headed back up the hill (and then entirely downhill after that initial tough ascent from Coquette). It was a fantastic couple of days in the Shasta Wilderness.

 

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