This is Flag Falls on Table Mountain (not Cow Falls). I thought it was interesting to have the cows in the field above them.
I saw a heck of a lot of cow bones on my way out to Flag Falls. It was definitely very eerie walking through this one particular wooded area, thinking that a mountain lion was going to ambush me. I did see a coyote in this area. Coyotes are ok. Mountain lions are not.
The first waterfall I went to last Saturday was this one I had never been to before, called: Catamount Falls. It is a really nice 45 ft. high cascade and definitely a sweet looking waterfall, and quite easy to get to.
Except for the poison oak. I was absolutely positive I never touched any poison oak on my hike, and because of that, I never bothered to scrub down when I got home. Next day: my entire body is covered with poison oak rash. Oh crazy stupid waterfall hunter! I must have picked it up going down here to Catamount Falls. There was certainly oak around, though I was pretty sure I had avoided it all. Apparently not! Ugh. Well, it was worth going down to this waterfall, but next time I will be sure to scrub off the oak when I get home.
This is a fairly recently “discovered” waterfall on Table Mountain, not by me. I would have come here much sooner, but the drought prevented me. This waterfall has a very small drainage and needs a lot of rain before it will be flowing. We just have not had that in the last couple years. This weekend we had enough to get all the waterfalls flowing, so I made a point of getting down to it this time, finally.
The person who “discovered” it came up with the name Catamount Falls (which, by the way, is another name for mountain lion, and there certainly seem to be plenty of these on Table Mountain). I am surprised the name has caught on as much as it has. My own name for this waterfall was Lower Hollow Falls, which to me makes a bit more sense, but nonetheless I still like the name Catamount, so we will certainly go with this name.
New episode of Waterfall Madman. Please watch in HD:
Another 2 inches of rain on Thursday/Friday, and that means Saturday is a waterfall day. Of course on Friday night I have to get sick. Our whole family is in the dumpsters now. I caught my wife’s bad cold (as did my two kids), and I slept awful on Friday night. Well, I could not let that deter me. If it was not a waterfall day, I surely would have slept in, but we have had so precious few of these days in the past 14 months, I had to get out even if I was puking every half mile. Fortunately, that was not the case. It was just a cold. Of course, I feel worse on Sunday because of it, but that is besides the point.
Another place I have not been to in a long while because of the drought: Table Mountain. In a normal winter, I come here multiple times. There are still places I have not explored here. I did come here once last year, but I cannot even count that time, because the flow was very low, and we only went to Phantom Falls, which was just barely a trickle. This weekend would be a different story. All the waterfalls would be flowing quite well, and they were indeed. It has been so long, and I am so grateful to God for the rain we have had in February – and yet we need so much more. This last little bit of rain pushed Folsom Lake up to 32 percent from 30 percent capacity. It will probably go a point or two higher from the runoff over the course of this week, but average capacity at this time of year is 55 percent. We are all praying for a miracle in March.
My plan of action was to go to Phantom Falls, Flag Falls, and beyond. First up, however, was Hollow Falls and Lower Hollow Falls (aka Catamount Falls). I had never been to the lower falls there before, though it is a very easy hike. Normally I leave Hollow Falls to the end, after my main hike, and by that time it is sunny out and pointless to go down to Hollow Falls. This time I decided to go to Hollow Falls first. A wise decision, madman. The lower falls is a really nice looking 45 ft. high cascade. That one is on a different stream with a very small drainage, and I was happy to see it flowing well. Hollow Falls was rocking. All in all a very good sign. I will be sharing all these other photos soon.
After this it was off to Phantom Falls. The sun was trying to come through, and I thought it would break before I got to Phantom Falls. Thankfully, however, the clouds rolled back in, and we got a couple more showers before the end of the hike, so I was worried about the sun for nothing. I have seen Phantom Falls at bigger flows before, but it was still flowing quite strong, and looking good today.
I crossed the stream at the top of Phantom Falls and continued on to Flag Falls. Why, you ask? I have been to Flag Falls before. Why would I want to go back there? It is such a long hike out that way. Well, I did not actually want to go to Flag Falls, but I wanted to go beyond it. There are a couple other waterfalls out that way on very small drainage streams. One of them looked like it was actually a very good size. However, you cannot see them! I could only get a glimpse of the first one, the very top of the waterfall, before the trees obscured it completely from view. If there were no trees there, it would be a great looking waterfall. The other one I could not see at all. This was such a bummer! They would have been awesome new finds. Someone needs to go cut down those trees beside that waterfall. It would require someone to repel down the cliff, however. Any takers? Ha ha, I’m just kidding of course.
Anyway, after this I did not dawdle. I wanted to get back to Hidden Falls quickly. It is a bit freaky way out that far past Phantom Falls. I’m not kidding. When you continue past Hidden Falls on the way to Flag Falls, there is an area that is somewhat wooded, lots of trees, lots of places for mountain lions to hide. There are a ton of cattle bones around this area. They were scattered all over, I am not kidding. In other words, it is a high activity area for mountain lions, and I was very wary, looking constantly about me. It is a freaky place. Then I saw a big animal off in the distance. I looked closer, and saw it was a coyote! Well, that is much better than seeing a mountain lion. When it saw me, it took off. I think I got video of it, but it was a bit far away, so I’m not sure. Anyway, I got out of the wooded area, crossed over the stream at the top of Hidden Falls, had my lunch at the falls viewpoint there, at which point it started raining again, making for a wet lunch, then I made the long slow journey back to the car. It was certainly a great day on Table Mountain.
Still no rain in California. But I still have faith. It is coming.
Some people think there is no water anywhere in California, but that is just not true. You do need to be looking in the right places, however. Hence my hike this weekend to the Little North Fork of the Middle Fork Feather River. Or LNFMFFR for short. Or LiNoFoMiFoFeR if you want to get a little silly. I like silly. I knew that this river would have some water in it, though I did not know how much. I was not expecting much, but I knew the waterfalls would flowing somewhat at least.
There is supposed to be a 30 footer on this river. Somewhere. I am more confused now about where it might be, or if it might be. I found a trail on my National Forest map going down to the river, though it is not on my Topo map, nor is it listed anywhere on the National Forest website or elsewhere. I thought it might be one of those old trails that no longer exists, and as such did not have much hope of finding it, but it seemed to me if I could find this trail down to the LiNoFoMiFoFeR, and once there, work my way downstream a short distance, I would find the waterfalls. I found the trail. It was actually a well marked trail and it seemed a well traveled and easy to follow trail, and it went right down to the river exactly where I thought it would. I found much evidence of an old mining operation down at the river, including the very interesting remains of an old mining bridge over the river. The trail is called the Sky High trail. Actually I lied. It is listed on the NF website, but I did not notice it because of the name of the trail: the name does not intuitively indicate you are hiking down to the Little North Fork river.
Another bonus: the river was flowing very very well. Much stronger than I would have thought possible. Why? I am not really sure but I think it might be snow melt that is happening since it has been so warm recently. Anyway, it was a pleasant surprise.
However, working my way downstream from here was totally out of the question. Steep cliffs lined both sides of the river. Going downstream was not possible. However again, there was a small waterfall right here, and this was actually one of the waterfalls I was looking for or so I thought, which I had initially figured would be much further downstream. The kayakers call this one Jaroslav’s Drop or something, but now it gets even more confusing because the kayakers say this waterfall is 30-40 ft. high. It is only 12 ft. high at tops! Although I was certain at the time that this was what was called Jaroslav’s Drop, now I am not so certain. I think there still might be a 30 footer on this creek. Somewhere. But where? If it is downstream, it will not be possible to get to it. Upstream the terrain seems too flat and unlikely for any waterfalls. It is a mystery, and more research will be required to find it. But I will be back again someday for sure. And perhaps quite soon.
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In search of a new waterfall in northern California. I had read reports from kayakers of waterfalls on Patterson Creek, indeed the description was so precise that I was absolutely certain of finding a 30 ft waterfall on this creek.
I arrived at the trailhead at dawn. There was a huge cat with a big fluffy tail running around. Except that it did not move anything like a cat. It was jumping around, and zipping back and forth, up and down, like a cat possessed. Cats do not move like that. That is because it was not a cat, I realized! It was a fisher! Wow, I have never seen a fisher in the wild before. Neato mosquito. It was still too dark to take any pictures, but I grabbed my Go Pro video camera hoping to get some footage of the little monster. But for some odd reason, when I turned it on, it was on the camera setting, not the video setting, so I thought I was taking video but I was not! Oh that just figures.
Well after the fisher disappeared up the mountain, I started on my hike. There was snow on the ground, and it was very hard packed, which made for a fun hike. But a long one and a tough one. It should have been only 3 miles to the creek confluence of the north and main forks of Patterson, but it was 4 miles at least, and along the way the road led up a steep mountain I had to climb up. All this happened awhile ago at Christmas when my back was still recovering. Going on a tough hike like this was really stretching it for my back.
I arrived at the confluence which is where the waterfall should be. No waterfall. I descended to the north fork of the creek, crossed it, and ascended the ridge between the two creeks, thinking the waterfall would be right on the other side of the ridge. No waterfall. I continued up the ridge as far as I could possibly go, which was quite a distance. No waterfall. This did not make any sense. There definitely should have been a waterfall here. The kayaker’s description was very precise, and now I realize: very wrong! Well that was a big bummer. I think there actually are waterfalls on Patterson Creek, but much further up. It would have been at least two more miles one way on the road in order to get up to them, and my back was already well past its limit. There is no way I could have continued any further. So I hiked back to the car. Very bummed.
It is a very very long drive up to Patterson Creek in the northern part of the state, and all for nothing. Well, not quite all for nothing. I stopped at Shackleford Falls on the way back. It was about noon but still in shade, as I knew it would be. It was not flowing as beautifully as it was the last time I was here, but it was certainly a very nice consolation prize after a very long hike.