REFUGE
Another adventure. And a surprise waterfall found. Not bad for a quick morning hike.
I was totally off road on Saturday morning’s hike, looking for a new waterfall near Devil’s Falls in Colfax. I thought there might be a good sized waterfall in New York Canyon (not THE New York Canyon, a different New York Canyon). The path I took down to the creek was surprisingly easy. I expected to be bushwhacking through ticks and poison oak, but instead I found a decent path that obviously had been traveled before. That in itself is very odd considering how remote this place is, and that there is pretty much no parking at all on the very narrow and steep Shirttail Canyon Rd.
However, I soon found out it is not so remote after all. Once down at the creek I found a road! And a camper! I was pretty shocked to find these things down here. I think it actually might be private property, but of course there was no one around, and thus I continued on.
I had to make my way up Refuge Canyon in order to get to New York Canyon. It started off pretty easy until I got to the waterfall. I was certainly not expecting to find this waterfall in Refuge Canyon. I like these kind of surprises! It is about 20 ft. high in total height, not a bad little surprise indeed.
Getting up close to it was impossible, however. The canyon walls got very narrow and steep here. I could not continue. I tried to climb up the side of the cliff, I came very close, but I just could not quite do it. It was just a little steep, and one slip and I would have been in big trouble, sliding down the cliff into the creek. So bummed, I started to make my way back, still looking for a way up. Finally, I found a path going up to the top. It was filled with poison oak, but it was actually a decent trail and once up on top, the trail continued high along the creek.
When I got to the top of the waterfall, I made my way down to a viewpoint. It was difficult to photograph the falls from here, as there was no clean view. The cliff was scary steep and I did not want to tempt fate by getting closer. There were also a million ladybugs here. I tried not to disturb them but they were all over my backpack as soon as I put it down. Crazy-ness.
The trail continued all the way to New York Canyon where I expected to find a much bigger waterfall. Unfortunately, all I found there was a small 12 footer. It was kind of nice though, so I took a photo. As I was taking my photos, I happened to glimpse something coming down out of a tree in the distance. It was a bit far away and I only got a glimpse but I think it might have been a mountain lion. I suppose it could have been a squirrel. How on earth could I mistake a squirrel for a mountain lion, you ask? Well, yeah, I don’t know. All I can really say is it seemed a lot bigger than a squirrel. I did not wait to find out. I packed up my bag and got the heck out of there. Holy molies.
Waterfall Madman Episode 5 is now here. Watch in HD if you can.