Leon Turnbull Photography

The latest El Nino forecast has arrived and it continues to increase in strength. It hit the “strong” level in August for the first time. A key factor will be when it peaks. It not showing any sign of peaking yet, but is apparently forecast to max out in the December timeframe. If it peaks too early, it will not have the impact on our winter weather that we are hoping and praying for.

Despite what you may have heard from other forecasters, there have only been FOUR strong El Ninos since 1950. To clarify: four strong El Ninos “in the winter”; three of these had above average rain in California in the winter, and the fourth had “slightly above average” rain. Let me explain: The four strong El Ninos were: 1998, 1983, 1958, and 1973. As we all probably know, the first three had well above average precipitation for northern CA in the winter. No question about that. In 1973, however, I see about 103% of average precipitation for northern CA, noting that this strong El Nino peaked early in November (but still remained strong through the winter). Usually, forecasters referring to 1973 say it was an above average year for this strong El Nino, but I don’t think you can say 103% is “above average”, to me it is more “average”, but if you really want to then say “slightly above average”. The Southern Sierra may have been slightly higher that year.

There were two other strong El Ninos since 1950: 1966 and 1988. Both of these years had well below average winters for northern CA. However, it must be noted that both of these El Ninos were on the very low end of strong; the El Nino of 1988 peaked in the summer and was not strong when winter started; the El Nino of 1966 peaked in November/December and by January it was down to moderate strength. That is a very important distinction. Does it rain in the summer in California? No it doesn’t! So in the heart of winter, these strong El Ninos were not strong! Therefore, in my opinion, it is not appropriate to say El Nino was strong in those years if you are talking about predicting precipitation in the winter for California; they were moderate El Ninos during the winter of those years, not strong ones.

The other factor we have is the warm blob of water off the coast. In past strong events, this blob did not exist, and it also could be the reason we are currently in a four year drought. If it was not there, it is quite likely at least 2 of the 4 years we would have had average or above average precipitation. So will it affect the strong El Nino, and how? No one knows of course; personally I think it likely it will have some sort of negative effect, but the question is how much.

If we do have a big winter, I will be extremely excited of course. I was not living in California during the last big El Nino. I moved down here in 1999. I am already trying to map out where I will be hiking and what waterfalls I will be visiting this winter. Are you making your list yet? Pictured here is the Lower Middle Fork Tuolumne River Falls, 182 ft. high. Is this going to one of the waterfalls I will be visiting? Perhaps it will, though it is not specifically on my list (but nonetheless, I will be visiting this area for sure next year). If you have not seen it yet yourself, then you will certainly want to put it on your list. It is going to be amazing next year at high flows.

Our company moved its office to Roseville this week and I must say I’m hating the commute thus far. I used to work 10 minutes from home. Not anymore. The traffic is not so bad but it’s all the darn lights. There are about 5000 of them and I swear the city has programmed them so it is impossible to hit any of them green. Argh.

It also means it is now too difficult to get to the south shore of Tahoe after work on Friday. Going to the north shore is about the only option. So that’s what I did.

It was raining hard when I got to Truckee but by the time I started my hike it was all done. A nice sunset over looking the lake would sure be nice. I haven’t had good luck up here for sunsets this year. I hiked up the Tahoe Rim Trail (first time I’ve ever been on this trail). The info I read said there were good views of the lake on this section. I found nada. I think I would have had to walk a lot farther on the trail to see any, so I decided to climb up to the top of Barker Peak. Surely there would be a good view from up there. Instead I found a big old ridge blocking my view. I could only see a partial view of the lake and it didn’t seem worth staying up there for sunset. I did not like it. Plus I was way off the main trail and I did not have my GPS. Hiking back in the dark might be big trouble.

So I ran back down the mountain to the car as fast as my chubby legs would take me, and drove back down to lakeside, arriving there just before sunset. There was a dock there which I walked out on, but there was not much color out over the lake. Bummer. Then I looked behind me and saw some spectacular color. I was on the wrong side of the lake. Doh! I should have gone to the east side. No time to do that now. I tried to take some shots anyway. It was pretty nice but the angle was not great. The weird thing was there was another photographer there on the dock shooting the nice color but he was standing right along the shore, a far worse angle. Why didn’t he pass by me to get a better angle? Strange. Anyway the color was all done so I packed up and made the long drive home.

Well we just got back from our summer vacation to Canada. No waterfalls seen up there, though not for lack of trying.

It was just me and the kids visiting my family up there, as my wife had to stay home this year, unfortunately. On one day, we decided to go up to the top of magnificent Old Glory, myself, my sister Tania, brother in law Lynal, son Jadon (13), and niece Hannah (13). It is the highest and most prominent peak in the Rossland Range area, 7800 ft. high. The hike is about 6.5 miles one way up, with a gain of 3200 ft. (actually 3700 ft. total elevation was hiked due to one annoying downward stretch). Jadon thought it was a lot more difficult than our recent Eastern Sierra hike, though I did not think so (but it is too difficult to compare the two hikes because they are not similar). Hannah, meanwhile, essentially ran up and down the mountain once she got going (she did not want to go at first). There were quite a few wildflowers still out on the mountain, though definitely past peak. It would be awesome when the flowers are in full bloom up there. I had a tiny bit of cloud cover so I managed to get this photo (handheld, no tripod – shame on me). Once at the top, we all enjoyed the glorious views around us: the ski hill on one side, Nancy Greene Lake on another, the city of Trail on another, and a huge cliff on the last side. Both Jadon and Hannah ran down the mountain together getting way ahead of the rest of us, which was highly disturbing to us, especially since they went the wrong way down. We were going to take a short cut, but they did not wait for us at the junction, and ended up going down the very long way. But we had no idea which way they went, so while Tania and Lynal went down the short way, I went the long way, running down the trail to catch up to them. I eventually caught up to them. I was not pleased, I had not wanted to hike 13 miles that day. Did they not know this was grizzly bear and cougar territory? Ah, teenagers. What can you do?

On the way down, I saw one old timer hiking up the mountain. He was not going the long, easy way around to the top (which is along the ridge on the south side). Instead he was going straight up the east face (the one seen in this photo). It looked crazy and far too cliffy to me when I examined it but he insisted there was a good route up that way. Yeah, right. Ok good luck with that old man. I think I might try it some day, though. Ha!

Old Glory was initially named (likely) by Americans back in the Gold Rush days in the late 1800s. In those days, Americans thought British Columbia was going to become part of the Union. It did not, of course. Nonetheless, I have always loved the name of this mountain. It seems so appropriately named, being the most prominent and magnificent peak in the region. It looks so old and majestic and alone. From 1944-68 it was the site of the highest weather station in the world. These incredible men lived up on top of the mountain year round. You can see some remains of the house, but not very much is left. I just cannot imagine being up there in the cold deep winter, or during a summer lightning storm. It is pure nuts. I am currently reading a book called (strangely enough) Old Glory, written by one of these men, Ron Walker. It is a fascinating and humorous history of the mountain, and highly recommended, especially if you are an old Rosslander, like myself.

Once we all safely (and without being eaten by a grizzly) got back down to the car, we were all very happy to go to the Colander in Trail for dinner. Simply put: the best spaghetti on Earth. Yumm!

Sunset at Horsetail Falls, Desolation Wilderness. This is just above the lowest section of the falls. As you can see, the water level was very low. Normally all that rock would be covered in water, in fact I have never before seen it otherwise until now.

Anyway, I had to wait around 30 minutes or so for the sun to set. I knew those clouds would color up, just not sure how much. It was not too shabby.

From here it is a 45 minute hike down the mountain, so for most of the hike I was hiking in the dark netherlands. No worries, I had my headlamp. No unruly critters were seen on the way back down.

My favorite summer waterfall destination is Horsetail Falls. It normally flows strong all through summer, but this year, however, the flow is as low as I have ever seen it. Nonetheless, that low flow did allow me to get up close to this particular spot, which has never been even remotely possible any other time I’ve been here.

I arrived at the trailhead after work and made the hike up to the falls. There were quite a few people on the trail, as usual. Don’t all these people have to work on Fridays?

When I arrived at the waterfall I saw a big group of kids (pre or early teen) coming down from the top of the falls, with one adult leader. They were coming down the wrong way. I have to say that I hate this place. Now now, I do not hate Horsetail Falls, obviously, I love it … but I do not like the terrain around here. When I was younger it never bothered me, but now it kinda freaks me out. Does that mean I am wiser now, or just an easily frightened old fogey? It is very steep at the waterfall, with big dropoffs, and the granite rock is slippery and very dangerous, even when dry. Many people have died here, and if you are not  careful, you might be next. Well onto my story …

Most of the kids went back up the mountain to come down again the proper way, except three: the adult and two of the kids. The two kids were just wearing running shoes, with no proper grip for this slippery granite. They came down, somehow, to the top of this 50 ft. section of the falls (shown here). I am not even sure how they got to this spot, but there is no way from there to continue down on that side. They then proceeded to JUMP across the creek at the top of the waterfall. Did I mention that this rock is very slippery? One mistake and you are a dead man (or kid). They all made it. I was holding my breath the entire time. The last thing I wanted to do was fish a body out of the water from the bottom of the falls. Once on the other side, they then had to scale down the cliff to the bottom of the falls. It is steep on the other side as well, and again very slippery with big dropoffs. At the bottom of the falls, they jumped back to the other side again, where there is another smaller waterfall. I watched as they cleared the wet section of rock on their jump by mere centimeters. Oh my Lord!

I was just sitting there watching them do all this from my (safe) vantage point on this side of the waterfall. I swear I was not going to say anything to him when he came up past me. I wanted to say a lot, but I was not going to. Really. It is one thing to put your own life in danger, but quite another altogether to put the lives of your kids in danger unnecessarily. I don’t know if any of these kids were his own children, or not, possibly one or two of them was, but it does not matter. He is responsible for all of them. I wanted to smack him over the head. But I was not going to say anything. When he came up to to me, though, he said something or other, like that was not a very good route to take down. The words just came out of my mouth, I had no control over them, whatever spirit was possessing me at the time said them. I said: It was pretty darn stupid if you ask me. Ok, that was harsher than I wanted to say it. Like I said, I had no control over what I said. Well perhaps it was not really that harsh, he agreed with me that it was stupid. Maybe he learned his lesson and next time he won’t be such an idiot, and he won’t end up with a Darwin award.

Anyway, after they left, I then proceeded to follow in the footsteps of their stupidity. I am kidding! I did, however, go down to the bottom where they had jumped back across, and then rock hopped up the bottom of the creek bed to the base of this 50 ft. section of the falls. There were a couple tricky spots to be sure, and some of the rocks were quite slippery. I was careful and made it without incident. I sat on a big rock in the middle of the creek, enjoying this magnificent spot. Even with a little bit more water, it would not have been possible to do this.

The clouds over the valley were looking quite promising, so I stuck around for sunset. It was not electric, like I thought it might be, but it was decently colorful. That picture is coming up next. Then I hiked back to the car in the dark. This time, I had my headlamp. No worries. As usual, I was the last one off the mountain.