BRUSHY
Well I was hoping to get to multiple waterfalls on this day, and this first hike would be easy smeasy. Yeah, sure.
It is a very very long drive out to this waterfall on Brushy Creek, about an hour drive or more, past Oroville. It is hard to get motivation to go out there because I need to get up so darn early, but with the higher water flows right now, I thought I would finally try this one.
If you look at Google Earth, it seems you can see the entire 215 ft. high waterfall from the top of the ridge, and thus would be a very easy hike. I had to hike an extra 1.5 miles because there was snow on the road (at 4000 ft.), but it was easy and refreshing. I thought I had lots of time. I reached my viewpoint on the top of the ridge, but the waterfall was completely out of sight. I came all the way out here for nothing.
There is only one thing to do now. Go down. It seems from Google Earth and the topo maps, that it is one massive cliff below this ridge. I was not expecting any chance to get down it, but it turned out that it was not cliffy at the top. Steep yes, but definitely possible. So down I went. 1000 ft. down. It was not really “brushy”, but there was poison oak galore. I did not quite get all the way to the bottom, however, because the bottom 100 or so feet were indeed a cliff, but I came to a spot right across from the massive waterfall. It was spectacular, but the view was obscured. I could not get a clear view of the falls from there, and there was definitely no going any further. It would have been amazing with a clear viewpoint from there. I could see the creek which the falls dumps into going in full torrent, and a small 10 ft. waterfall on that creek. The only people I know that have ever been to this massive waterfall are insane kayakers on this creek/river, not any normal people have seen this before me. Scratch that, no normal person would ever hike down this mountain. It’s just too bad that I could not get all the way to the bottom. The viewpoint I did find of the falls was from further up the mountain, about halfway down from the ridge (or so). It was a beautiful view of the falls. It was the only good one I could find.
So back up the mountain I went, 1000 ft. up. I had initially hoped to go on a big hike (10 miles) in the afternoon, but there was no way I could do that now. I was too tired from this first hike that was supposed to be very easy. So I drove back to Oroville, had lunch at Jake’s (of course), then drove home. It was a pretty good day. I just hope I don’t get that darn itch again.