Upper Horse Creek
This is Upper Horse Creek Falls, 82 ft. high. It is a very pretty waterfall. I was a bit shocked to see all the yellow bushes around the base of the falls. You might think this shot was taken in October. But this is the end of August, and they are changing color already? The Aspens are still very green, but I’m not sure why the other bushes are yellow yet (I know they are not yellow all year). Anyway, I think this might be a very pretty scenic waterfall to shoot when the Aspens are changing as well.
After shooting Lundy Canyon in the morning, I drove into Lee Vining, had lunch, and then took a nap in the afternoon. My original plan was to shoot sunset at Mono Lake, sleep overnight in my vehicle somewhere, then get up in the morning to do another hike. However … the entire area was covered in heavy stormy clouds, it was starting to rain, and it sure did not look like there would be much of a sunset at Mono Lake. I thought to myself, well what should I do? I could stick around and hope the skies clear for sunset. It was a possibility. But there was another option. I could just skip Mono Lake, do my other hike in the afternoon, and drive home that same night. I was very tired from my morning hike in Lundy Canyon, and was not sure I could do another high elevation 4 mile hike. But the nap refreshed me and gave me energy back. Plus, I didn’t really want to stay the night in Lee Vining anyway. I would be kicking myself if there ended up being a spectacular sunset at Mono Lake, but I decided on Plan B. (as it turned out, the clouds seemed to get worse by sunset, and I don’t think there was much of a sunset at Mono Lake that evening – whew).
So I drove up to Twin Lakes at Bridgeport and started hiking up to Horse Creek Falls. The hike gains 1100 ft. of elevation in 2 miles, but the grade was very gentle and easy going. I felt very good and had no troubles with the hike. I noticed that there are tons of deer around Twin Lakes. In fact, I think I saw more deer on this day, then I have in the past 3 years total. I think the campers feed them (which is not very smart), as I saw one person hand feeding one deer, and another one I saw on the trail walked right up to me (looking for a handout, I guess). It was quite tame but I had no handout for her, so continued on past. There are two waterfalls on Horse Creek. The first one is a big one, and I think most people do not even realize it is here, or how big it is anyway. The trail comes to the bottom of the cascade, then switches back well away from the creek, and comes back to it at the top of the waterfall. The total height of the waterfall is about 360 feet. But from the trail, you can only see the bottom part of it, and when the creek flow is low, it does not look very impressive. In the spring it would look a lot more interesting. On my way back down, I hiked right alongside of it from the top to the bottom (off the main trail), and I found some good spots to photograph it. It is definitely a fabulous cascade.
Upper Horse Creek Falls is 82 ft. high, and is a much prettier waterfall and the trail goes right beside it (and thus, I think more people stop here to look at this one). This one looks nicer when the flow is lower as well, as it comes down in many small rivulets. It is a beautiful hike, I think I’ll definitely be back here someday.