Leon Turnbull Photography

I think this was the third hardest hike I’ve ever done, after Wabena Falls, and another hike I did in British Columbia a few years ago. It was all worth it.

The elusive and mysterious waterfalls on the north side of Mount Shasta have had me pulling my hair out for awhile now. Whenever I drive by Whitney Creek on Hwy 97, it is always dry. It does not seem to matter when. Spring, Summer, Winter, whatever. In the spring it is dry. Why? You would think there would be some snow melt on this creek in a good year (which we had this year). It was dry this spring, but the actuality is that these waterfalls do flow in the summer, and when I drove by on our trip to Canada, I found that Whitney Creek had water in it. Finally. Three weeks later I came back.

The plan was to hike up to Coquette Falls. It is 2300 ft. elevation gain in about 3 miles. Ugh. Cough. Phhttt. What was I thinking? I literally almost did not make it. There was not a trail the entire way, and I came to a very brushy area, which was so bad, I almost turned back. My legs got scratched up ridiculously, but I determined to persevere, and eventually came to a road, which got me up the rest of the way. The hike up was relentless. With about 300 ft. (in elevation) to go, I could not continue any further. I was done. But I could not stop now, I was too close. I kept going. Ten steps up, rest, and repeat. It took over 3 hours to get up this viewpoint of Bolam Creek Falls, 82 ft. high. It is a glorious spot, with incredible views of Shasta and Shastina, rarely seen from this angle, and far away down into the valley is Lake Shastina.

When I arrived, the waterfall was in shade (as expected), but the rest of the area was not (as expected). I found a little tree that was blocking the sun, and I setup shop there to take photos. It would have been nice to have my big lens, but that would have been ridiculous to lug that heavy thing up the mountain. I most certainly would not have made it if I had been carrying it. There was not much in the way of clouds, but I waited until one little one passed in front of the sun, which helped manage the lighting on the scene. I waited quite a while more, but no other clouds presented themselves to help me (that was not very nice of them). I tried to eat food, but I could not eat much. I was too spent from the hike to even eat, except an apple, my pudding, and half of my sandwich.

I could see that Coquette Falls was completely dry, so I did not go up any further. I seriously could not go any further anyway. My legs would rebel. Sadly, I think Coquette is dead. The glacier is not melting into that drainage any longer, there is not enough flow left from the glacier melt. I really wish I could have seen it when it was still going. Does anyone know Dr. Who’s phone number? The other waterfalls on this side of Shasta are dying as well. Bolam still has decent flow in the summer, however, but how long does it have left? I’d like to come back up here in the future and explore further, but that would be nuts. Of course, I said the same thing after I first went to Wabena Falls, then I went back to it. At least it was all downhill back to the car.

I got my daughter up early yet once again, she is a real trooper. We drove up the mountains in Bend to go on this very easy hike on Fall Creek.

It was extremely cold up on the mountain that early in the morning. I even had to put on my long pants, the first time I have had to do that this summer.

The waterfall is only 24 feet high, but it puts out a heck of a lot of mist. No joke. There was literally no place I could take a photo of this falls easily due to the mist. I tried my best, but I had to shoot from further back than I wanted to. It is definitely a fun little waterfall.

My tripod ball head also broke. I do not understand what happened but it would not stay stable. That makes it difficult to take photos. I tried putting first aid tape around it (it was all I had!), but that did not work anyway. Well what can you do. Argh. Thankfully, I was able to fix it when I got back home (and not using tape!). I thought I might have to fork out $200 for a new one. I am the man. The waterfall madman.

I managed to get most of the gang up at 5AM to go to this waterfall. My daughter, my mother, my brother-in-law Lynal, and even my niece Hannah. I was surprised they all wanted to come.

This is a very easy waterfall to get to, right beside the road. It is a bit surprising that they had not been here before since they live so close to it. If I lived here, I would be going to this one and all the others in the area at least once a year. But my family? Why have they not been to any of these great waterfalls so close to them? I have failed them. Sigh.

Along the way, we saw a bear and an elk. Elk are as common in Cranbrook as deer are in most other places.  The bear was cool. I find it interesting that my daughter saw zero bears in Alaska, but did see one in Canada. Canada wins! Canada also wins in hockey. Just saying.

Bull River is dam controlled, but I knew that they were currently releasing water from the dam. However, the website said the current flow was 1200 ft.³ per second and this is definitely not 1200. It seems more like about half that amount, or less. The rest of it must be going into the powerhouse. Oh well. At least it is flowing decently well.

The waterfall is right under the bridge pretty much, so that makes it a bit difficult to see. You can get right to the cliff edge, but no you can’t. It is very treacherous here, and although I inched my way out to the edge of the cliff, as close as I possibly dared to go, I still cannot see the bottom of the waterfall. From the bridge, however, I climbed up on the railing, and I was able to see the entire waterfall and take a photo of it. From this extreme angle, it makes the waterfall seem much smaller than it really is. It is actually 44 ft. high. That is your guaranteed measurement, and if you are in the area, why not come to see it? Don’t wait for 10 years to see it, like my family did. Sigh.

We got up super early in the morning (3AM) to drive to Cranbrook to visit my sister. On the way of course, we stopped for a waterfall. I can’t believe I talked my mom into getting up that early. Nekoda is like, whatever, she’ll just sleep in the car anyway. She pretty  much slept the entire trip from California to Canada.

Priest River Falls is a very gorgeous waterfall (Priest River / Morning Worship – get it? ha ha) way out in the middle of nowhere. I’m not exaggerating about the nowhere part. It is not to be confused with the Priest River Falls in Idaho. Actually, that one is called Upper Priest River Falls even though it’s downstream from this one. Makes perfect sense, right? The two falls are quite close together but you cannot hike from one to the other because you would be crossing the border. I really think there should be a cross border trail between the two waterfalls. That would be super cool. Ah well.

Anyhow, we drove as far as we could and then could drive no further as we came to a river crossing. We had to walk from here, and that meant wading across the river. Nekoda and I went first quickly. I did not have much time to get to the falls before the sun was on it. I really did not think my mother was going to wade across that very cold river so we just left her there. I did leave arrows for her in case she did decide to come.

We arrived at the overlook to the waterfall. It was very nice, but partially obscured. There was a very very steep trail going down to the bottom. I got out my rope, and Nekoda and I started to descend. However, it got too steep and dangerous, and much too slippery because the ground was wet from rain and the tree roots were slick as ice. It was too crazy even for me so I just took photos from the overlook. Nearby, Nekoda discovered the spot where the local cougar likes to eat his breakfast, along with all the leftover bones. She was very confused why they were there until I explained. The explanation did not give her any comfort.

Meanwhile, my mother showed up at the overlook to see the waterfall. She did make it after all, and she did not even notice the lovely arrows I left for her on the ground.  Nonetheless she found the falls, though her feet were cold for the rest of the morning from wading across that river. But it was all worth it. It is a very beautiful 58 foot high waterfall, and very rarely seen since it is so far out from civilization.

My daughter and I were driving up to Canada for an unfortunately unscheduled trip to see my family because my dad just passed away. It was not an unexpected thing but my mom really appreciated the visit. Along the way we stopped at a couple waterfalls of course.

I heard horror stories about this hike to Trilbey Falls. I really wanted to try it, but I just wasn’t sure about bringing my 11-year-old daughter on this hike. I heard that it was crazy steep and crazy difficult. Almost certainly, I would not be able to get down to it. Well, it was worth a try. We could always turn back if it got too cliffy or impossible. I mean, how bad could it really be anyway? Famous last words, right?

There was supposed to be a trail. I could not find it. That meant we had to go straight down through the forest and through the brush. Nekoda said she was OK with that. Except that she wasn’t. And it was all my fault. As we descended, with me going first, I stepped right over a hornet nest (or wasp nest, or bee hive, or whatever). Whatever they were, they woke up from their afternoon nap. When she stepped over, she got stung on the leg. Ouch! Fortunately, she only got one sting. It could have been so much nastier than one sting. We quickly got further away from the nest so I could treat her leg with my first aid kit.

To her great credit, she did not want to go back up, but she wanted to keep going down to the falls. She is a trooper. So down we went.

I got the location of this waterfall from a certain site, but the location was not correct, and with no trail to follow, we ended up right at the bottom of the creek and found no waterfall there at all. Nonetheless, it was a very bizarre place, like something out of Lord of the Rings, I have not seen anything like it before. Huge mossy boulders were scattered all over the place, very old fallen trees, with big holes that you definitely did not want to walk over, quite dangerous, and it was very steep, and the creek was flowing in and out between the boulders. Thinking the falls must be behind the boulders, I carefully climbed over to the creek, but saw no waterfall. So back up the hill we went. I knew there must be a waterfall here somewhere and it must be hidden further upstream.

Hidden it was. You cannot even see it when you are right beside it but I did glimpse it from further down so I knew it was there. Somewhere. Nekoda thought I was high. There is no waterfall here she said. The only way to see it for reals is to get down to the bottom, but it was very cliffy. How would we get down?

Well, we did find a way and it really wasn’t too difficult. My daughter could even do it. I did use the rope to help with safety, but I probably didn’t really need it. Nekoda refused to use the rope. I think I may have raised a mountain goat. It was a very fun descent down to creek level, and that is where we finally saw the waterfall dropping 40 feet within a tight gorge in between two cliff edges. What a magnificent place, and what a magnificent waterfall. Nekoda said it was certainly the best waterfall we saw on our trip, despite the bee sting.

We did find the trail proper on the way back up, and it was very easy following it. No hornet nest, no steep cliffs. Nonetheless, I still could not see where the trail ended up back on the road, and the last part was still a bush whack. No wonder I did not see the trail on the way down. Oh well. We had much fun on this hike.