Winter Waterfall?
I was hoping to find a nice winter waterfall this weekend, though I wasn’t sure where to go. With a big storm coming in, I didn’t want to go over the passes to Tahoe, or I might get stuck over there for the weekend. I decided to try snow shoeing in to Bassi Falls, though I knew that waterfall probably wouldn’t be flowing too great.
I think God must have wanted me to get up and go out on Saturday morning because when I woke up it was not raining in Folsom. If it had been raining, I would have most certainly gone back to sleep. But since it wasn’t, I thought it might not be too bad up in the mountains, so I decided to head out. Of course, as soon as I got to Placerville, it started raining and raining hard. Well, it was too late to go back to bed, so I figured I would just continue on and see what I could see.
Once I got up on Ice House Rd., the rain turned into snow, but it wasn’t too bad yet. A snow plow had gone on ahead of me, clearing the road. The last time I went to Bassi Falls in the winter, there was no way to park along the road. I was a bit worried about that today, especially with the snow storm. I didn’t want to get stuck, or have a snow plow block me in somewhere. However, I was pleasantly surprised to find a large clearing directly opposite the turnoff to Bassi Falls. Perfect! I put my snowshoes on and started the long slow trudge up the road to Bassi Falls. In the summer, it is an easy 0.5 mile hike to the falls. But in the winter, it is a difficult 2.5 mile snowshoe, all uphill for the first 2 miles. The snow started falling more heavily on the way up, but it was definitely beautiful.
I knew that Bassi Falls would not be flowing all that great, and I knew it needs a lot of water for it to be even decent, but I did think there would be a lot more flow than there was. The waterfall was non-existent, and there was just a small amount of water flowing in Bassi Creek. I tried to find some kind of composition showing some water flow. There were not many options. In fact, I just found one small little cascade on the creek, and that was it. I crossed over to it carefully, wondering if I would sink through the snow into a deep pool of water. I didn’t. I setup my tripod, took the photo, then began the long slow trek back to Ice House Rd. At least it was mostly downhill on the way back, but it is still a long snowshoe and I was quite tired.
By the way, if you are thinking of heading out to Bassi Falls in the early spring, beware. There is a fallen tree across the road. In fact, it just fell while I was up at Bassi Falls. It was not me who did it! But I came across it on the way back and was quite sure I did not climb over it on the way up to the falls. Good thing it did not fall on me while I was crossing there. Anyway, you might want to bring a chain saw or something if you come up here in the spring before the forest service people get up there.
4 Comments