Leon Turnbull Photography

Well, I am back. We just returned from our Christmas vacation up to British Columbia, and I have many photos to process. I only had time to do one photo tonight and this is it.

Our first stop on the way up to Canada was at 186 ft. high Palouse Falls for sunset, and it is a doozy. Palouse Falls has been on my list to visit for quite some time, but for some reason I always figured it was just too far out of the way and I never got around to making a trip out to it. This time around, however, I actually looked at a map, and I realized it is not so far out of the way after all. In fact, it was only about a 1 hour drive out of the way on our trip up through Spokane to BC. I was excited to learn this. Indeed, if I had realized this, we would have gone to Palouse Falls a long time ago. We could have probably done it all in one day and after hitting Palouse, get to my parents house in BC well before midnight. My wife did not really like that idea, however. The poor kids would be suffering from a late drive. So we decided to stay an extra night in Spokane after hitting sunset at Palouse.

We arrived at Palouse Falls fairly early in the afternoon, a few hours before sunset. We had lunch out in the cold, then walked around a bit. I was happy to learn that Palouse Falls was flowing great. I had definitely expected much less flow for the winter. I also thought there would be more snow and ice around the falls. Too bad about the lack of snow, but I was definitely happy about the flow of the waterfall.

I had heard many reports that there is essentially only one spot to shoot Palouse Falls from, photographically speaking. And I had heard that it was on a very scary, narrow, and unobstructed ledge, with a humungous drop to the bottom if you missed a step. I was very worried about this. I was anticipating there to be snow and ice around, and I really didn’t want to be climbing out on an icy ledge to photograph the falls. I was happy to learn that it wasn’t quite as scary as I was anticipating. Yes, the ledge is a bit freaky for sure, but it is not dangerous to stand there, and I didn’t have to worry about snow and ice.

The sunset was fabulous, and I had it all to myself on this evening. It didn’t look like it would actually amount to much, and I was about ready to pack it all in and head back to the warm car, but then the color started appearing.What a sight. It was definitely worth the wait and the many years I had been waiting to finally get to Palouse Falls.