Leon Turnbull Photography

I only made it to one out of four waterfalls, but at least I was not shut out. Here is what happened. It is a long story but I hope you stay with me:

This was a four day backpacking trip into the Ventana Wilderness. I was waiting for a SHORT break in the weather and after SOME rain before doing this trip. Unfortunately on two counts: “some” rain was not enough on the Central Coast, and the “short” break has now become an awful much too long break. The February 1 stats are in: Rain fall in California is 68% of average (northern CA), 43% (central), and 30% (south). Snow pack is 27% of average (north), 30% (central), and 25% (south). The current dry period currently has no end in sight. It is so awful and upsetting.

Anyway … it was the morning of the lunar eclipse when I started driving down I-5 to towards the Central Coast. I did not plan this, but it just turned out this way. Every photographer in California I am sure was out somewhere photographing the event, a few of them came away with some great images. As for me, I did not bring my big camera and big lens with me. I never take those lugs on a backpacking trip and I was not going to leave that expensive equipment in the car for four days while I was out in the wilderness. I did not feel like I could get a good photo of the moon with my backpacking camera, nonetheless I did stop at the rest area on I-5 and took some video footage during the totality of the eclipse. It was not the place I wanted to stop to do this, but I was a bit late getting out of bed, and this turned out to be the only good place to stop.

Continuing on … I arrived at the trailhead at about 9AM and started my hike up into the wilderness. I would be gaining 2300 ft. in elevation on the first day (more, it turned out). So the big problem with this hike? Poison oak and ticks. The poison oak was mostly avoidable and I took great care to not touch it, and I did not get any rash. The ticks, however, were a different story. There were a heckuva lot of them, all over the place. Normally, ticks like hanging off the light brown/tan colored grasses hanging onto the trail. You can see them. Well, up here, they also like hanging off the dark brown/green brushes as well. You cannot see them. They even liked going on the poison oak. So if you touch it, not only do you get an awful rash, but you also get lyme disease. Just lovely. On top of all this, you are constantly swatting the gnats away from your face. And … you have to avoid stepping on all the California Newts that are all over the trail and do not move away when you approach them. I almost stepped on one because I was more concerned about avoiding the bloody ticks, but fortunately I did not step on any. It was very taxing to swath a path with my hiking pole through the grasses to avoid getting any ticks on me, but despite my best effort, I still ended up with two tick bites. It was very stressful. Honestly, this would have been an awesome hike if there were only no ticks.

The good news is that once I got above 4000 feet, the ticks and the poison oak disappeared (and the newts). The bad news: the trail was incredibly overgrown with manzanita and other brush growing over the trail. It was a huge effort to hack my way through it. I ended up doing this section four times! (why? read on…) I made it to the top and rested. It was already past noon. Now I wanted to descend down into a canyon (off trail), but this turned out to be far worse and more difficult than I anticipated. It was also the worst brush I have ever encountered on any hike I have ever done. This was much much tougher than it should be. Also, I began to highly doubt that there was even any water down in the canyon. If I got down there, and there was no water, I would be dead. Literally. I decided (wisely, I think) to go back up to the trail. It took an extra long time because I ended up going back up a different way and I came to  absolutely impenetrable brush. The worst ever. By far. I had to go back down, and then find the proper way to up. By the time I got back to the trail, I was spent, it was late in the day, and I was almost out of water. To continue on from here to the next campsite, it was still a very long hike, it would be more uphill, and I could not be sure there was even water there (there was, as it turned out, but only a small trickle, and it would not have been good). I decided (wisely, again, I think) to go back down the trail to the previous campsite. There was water there for sure and it was shorter, all downhill. Unfortunately, a long way downhill. Almost 2000 ft. I made it to camp an hour before dark, just enough time to setup camp and eat dinner.

The very tough thing about backpacking in winter is that it gets dark very early, at 5:30PM. That is too early to go to bed. However, I was extremely tired, and I ended up sleeping about 11 or 12 hours. I was certainly well rested by morning and recovered enough to try climbing up the mountain again. 2000 ft. back to the top of the ridge. This time I stayed all on trail.

So I have to say that this second effort was all worthwhile once I got to the top of the ridge. The views were OUTSTANDING! On one side, the mountains of the central coast were spectacular and beautiful and green. On the other side, I could see the ocean from up here. It was magnificent. It was glorious. It was emotional. It was calling out to me. When you see the ocean like this, you just want to abandon your plan and go straight to it. I could have done so. The trail sign in one direction said you could hike all the way to Big Sur. Believe me, I thought about changing my plan and doing this. However, I had no maps for this section of trail. How far was it? (a long way, probably) Would there be any water? (not likely) How would I get back? (probably, I wouldn’t). In the end, the waterfalls won out over the ocean. Incredibly, I had cell service up here. I took a photo of the ocean and sent it to my wife. She was not very amused, and she was very jealous (she loves the ocean).

Well on to my next campsite. All the trails up here seem to be (actually, are) longer than what my Topo map says they were. It took longer to hike than it should have taken. I got down to the campsite and the creek, and just had enough time to setup camp and eat my dinner. Then I had to go on my next hike, to the first waterfall. The way to get there is to wade straight up the creek. I was in the creek multiple times, crossing to one side, then the other side, straight through it, whatever seemed easiest to do. With the low flow in the creek, it was not difficult. It was a bit fun, but again, it took longer than expected. It did not seem that there would be any waterfalls on this creek. It was so flat. However, I finally came around a corner and there it was. Beautiful! The water and pool was a glorious green color. There was an undercut behind the falls, you could probably swim under (in the summer). It was a very unique looking falls. The entire trip was “almost” worth it, just to see this glorious waterfall, and it is about 50 ft. high. Yet, this was not the main waterfall I wanted to see on this trip. I returned to camp just before dark. Again, I was incredibly tired, and I slept very well.

The next morning my goal was to see two other waterfalls on this same creek. This time I hiked along the creek downstream from camp. Before too long, the water disappeared. The creek was completely and totally dry. This was very unexpected. The water in the creek bed all went underground. I continued on down the dry creek bed for a long while, hoping beyond hope that the water would return to the surface. However, it soon became very apparent that this was not going to happen. The waterfalls downstream were bone dry. Well this was a huge bummer. Stupid dry winter! There was nothing to do except return to camp. Since it was still fairly early, I decided to pack up camp, and head back up the trail. No sense staying another night at this campsite. I made it back to the same place I stayed at the first night. I was tired and even though I was only 3 miles from my car I decided to stay one more night out here and make the easy hike in the morning. The last 3 miles would be very tick infested and I was far too tired to do battle with them on this day. I know I would have lost the battle tremendously. In the morning, I could deal with them. I fell asleep listening to the owls hooting to each other somewhere out in the dark.

P.S. This waterfall will be up on my website very shortly:
http://waterfallswest.com/waterfall.php?id=sugar-falls-2174