It was dance show weekend for my daughter Nekoda. Since we had to go to the Bay Area it seemed like a perfect day to go early with Journey for a waterfall hike. Cataract Falls was our destination.
Cataract Falls is a very popular hike. We arrived at the trailhead at 7AM. There was already one car there in the very small parking area and two cars showed up right behind me. Already people on the trail and it is only 7AM! You will want to read to the end of the story.
We had the trail mostly to ourselves although I did see other people, of course. The weather forecast said it was going to be cloudy in the morning. There were absolutely zero clouds in the sky. Not even one. Doggone it. Those darn forecasters strike again. That meant I did not have a lot of time to get to the top so I did not stop at every waterfall along the way, just a few of them. Also, it is a little hard for Journey to get to some of the falls and I did not want to make things too difficult for her.
We rested at the top and Journey had breakfast. Instead of going back down the same way I decided to go back on the High Marsh Trail and Helen Markt Trail. This is a much longer hike but we had a lot of time and there were no people on this trail so Journey could be off leash the entire time. There would’ve been a lot of people going back on the Cataract trail. It was fairly tiring so when we finally got back down to the lake I thought we would have a good long rest there. Journey laid down for two minutes then she wanted to get going again. Crazy dog.
We got back to the main Cataract trail. Holy crikey! I could not believe my eyes. I must have cataracts! Major traffic jam! It is only about a mile back to the car from here but there were literally hundreds of people. Going up and going down. I knew there would be quite a few but this many? It was absolutely nuts. Journey was as surprised as I was to see so many people. It was a slow slog back to the car following the long line of people and not being able to pass any of them. It did not matter to us because we were done with our hike and had seen all the waterfalls but if you were hiking at this time, tell me how is this an enjoyable hike? It is far from enjoyable with this many people on the trail.
We got back to the car and drove to the park where we would meet up with my wife. Journey of course was overly ecstatic to see her and wanted to play fetch with her for the next hour. How are you not completely tired from our five hour hike, Journey? She is such an energizer bunny (as my wife always says). It was a wonderful and eye-popping morning in Marin County.
