Leon Turnbull Photography

I found this 25 ft. waterfall in Mad Canyon right beside the road. Getting up close to it was completely maddening! The poison oak was absolutely nightmarish! It was so bad I decided to come back the following week with my clippers, and tried to clip away all the oak as I scrambled up through the brush to the falls. I don’t think it worked because I still got the itch afterwards.

It was not even worth all that trouble anyway, the waterfall is not very photogenic and not very big. It looked a lot bigger from the road.

So here is photo proof that I went to the base of Phantom Falls. I do not really like the photo too much, but here it is anyway. Hopefully, I will get out and get a new waterfall this weekend.

And if you missed the video be sure to watch it (in HD). It is hilarious.

Being up north at the in-laws for the weekend, my initial plan for Good Friday was to go on a 12 mile hike to a couple new waterfalls. However, that all changed to naught when I could not get to sleep on Thursday night. Ugh. The hike would have involved getting up super early in the morning. Not only did I not want to get up early, I did not want to get up at all, and scrapped the idea of hiking all together. Instead, I took the kids to see Captain America, so it was not a lost day anyway.

On Friday night I slept much better, but still did not feel like going on a long hike, so I opted to go back to Lassen Volcanic Natl Park and West Sulphur Creek Falls. Easy drive, easy hike. I had wanted to get back here since I first discovered this 50 ft. waterfall last year.

When I arrived in Lassen, I found quite a bit more snow at the trailhead (6700 ft) than I thought there would be. About two feet of snow was on the ground. Considering that northern CA only has 25 percent of AVERAGE snow pack this year, I was thinking there would be much less snow here. A nice surprise but it made for a more difficult hike than anticipated.

It was very early but there was a big group already here. They were about to climb Lassen Peak and ski down. Cool. I wish I could join them.

Instead I opted for the Mill Creek trail (probably a very good idea since I did not have skis). The trail was all snowed over and no one had been on it. So in other words it was going to be difficult to follow. Good thing I had GPS or all hope would have been lost. The snow was hard packed so snow shoes were not needed but there were soft spots that I sank through. Nonetheless, I managed to keep moving forward and not downward.

400 feet lower in elevation I arrived at the West Sulphur Creek Falls viewpoint where there was only light patchy snow. Quite a difference from the trailhead. The waterfall was flowing beautifully and the view from top of the ridge is really sweet. It was way better than when I visited here last fall.

I had initially hoped to find a way down to the base of the waterfall. However that proved quickly to be quite impossible upon close inspection. The ground was very crumbly, and the slope far too steep and cliffy. Even with rope it was not going to work. I think however that I will return someday and make one more go of it, though if I do it will not be to go down that cliff.

There is a second waterfall located just above this one and that waterfall is even more elusive. So much so that it is impossible to see it at all. I was able to get to the brink of the upper falls but that is it. No views. It is sandwiched between massive cliffs on each side. Again though, I think I will try one more time in the future. If there’s a way I will find it.

I continued on downstream, which was my primary plan for the day. I thought there might be yet another waterfall on this creek. I hiked downstream and then literally crawled out on a knife edged ridge with cliffs on each side of me, in between West Sulphur Creek on the right and Mill Creek on the left. At the end of it, shortly before the confluence of those two creeks, I then worked my way down a steep slope on the right (for which I needed my rope) down to where the waterfall should be located on West Sulphur Creek. But alas, there was no waterfall. Darn. I was sure there would be at least a small one there. C’est la vie. It was still a very fun day in Lassen. And I will be back.

This was an extremely difficult waterfall to get to, there was a ton of poison oak, steep terrain, and I did not even get as far as I wanted to. But I did find this new 38 ft. high waterfall, so all was not completely lost.

This is Peavine Creek, near Foresthill. From Mosquito Ridge Rd, it is more than a 1400 ft. drop down to Peavine Creek. There is no trail. The poison oak is very abundant, especially as you get closer to the creek. I did not feel very comfortable hiking down into this canyon, for many reasons, some of which included wild animals jumping out of the wooded trees onto me. I thought multiple times about giving up and going back up. Usually these thoughts were most numerous in my head when the going started to get too brushy or the poison oak got worse. Then the terrain would clear a bit, and I decided to keep going. Down. Down. Down.

After a long struggle, I finally got close to the creek. Then it started getting much steeper, and the oak got much more plentiful. There was no avoiding the stuff anymore. When I got to the creek, I started working my way upstream. I still had a long way to go. I came to a couple small waterfalls where the creek split. The best way was to climb up between them. Off came my hiking shoes and on came my water shoes. Above these small waterfalls, I could see a larger waterfall in the distance, and this was my final destination. I measured it to be 38 ft. high, and it was difficult to photograph. I do not really like the big log sticking out in the middle, but I could not move any further to the right or I would be swimming. My camera also stopped working here for some reason. I have no idea why, and it seems to have fixed itself magically now, so perhaps God was telling me not to continue further.

I had no intentions of continuing on anyway, so God did not need to tell me that, but I am pretty sure there is a bigger waterfall above this one. It may or may not have been possible to get to it, but I was completely spent by the time I got to this one, and there was no way I could continue any more. Oh yeah, I still had to climb back 1400 ft. out of the canyon.

When I finally got back to the car, I found that I had a couple ticks embedded in me. It has been many years since I have had a tick bite. I am always very careful about checking myself constantly during hikes, but somehow these ones snuck under my clothing without me noticing. One was on the back of my arm, and I managed to get it out, but the other was on my back and I could not see it. I only saw it by the reflection in the window of my car when I checked myself over. I tried to pluck it out, but I was not certain I got all of it. I could not see “back there”. I was concerned so I decided I would drive quickly back down to the river where there surely would be people around I could get to help. On the way down, however, I saw a couple bicyclists ascending up the hill. I stopped and asked them if they would look at it. I am quite certain they thought I must have been some kind of maniac, because they were very hesitant about stopping. I do not blame them at all. Some weirdo saying he had a tick in his back way out in the middle of nowhere? Finally the guy turned around and came to look at it, and he was able to see that I had indeed gotten the entire tick out. Well I was sure glad about that and I thanked them profusely for stopping to help out the maniacal stranger.

So will I be back someday to do battle with the ticks and oak again? Maybe I will. Maybe I won’t. Probably I will.

Here is the latest Waterfall Madman video. Feel the roar at Bassi Falls:

This week has been very warm. The snow has been coming down all in one fell swoop. In fact, I think that in a matter of a couple days, we have already now reached and have gone past the peak of snow melt. There will not be very much snow left up in the mountains after this week.

All this means that the waterfalls are gushing right now. If you want to see any this year, you had better get up into the mountains now. It will not last too long.

And so I decided it was the right time to make my annual pilgrimage to Bassi Falls to see some hot diggity snow melt action. I suspect that I am the first one to visit Bassi Falls this year. I suspect I am the first who even thought of going there already. It is only mid April. Isn’t there still far too much snow on the road? Not this year my friends. The snow is kapoosh. But that does not mean you can just drive right to the trailhead. Even though there is no snow and it should be open, the road was gated at the turnoff near Ice House Rd. I knew this would be the case however, and expected to have to walk from Ice House Rd, but it is only an additional 1.5 miles, so it is no great difficulty.

The morning is not the best time to photograph Bassi Falls, but it was my only option for this weekend. It was also the weekend for our church’s annual all night prayer vigil. I signed up for the 4AM time slot, with the intention of driving up to Bassi Falls for sunrise afterwards, but time was of the essence because I had to be back at the church for a meeting at 9AM. I planned everything to a tee. Almost. I arrived up on Ice House Rd at 5:30AM in the dark. I could hear the roar of Bassi Creek though I was quite a distance away from it. Is that really the creek? Or is it the wind in the trees? There was no wind today. Well that certainly boded well for my hopes for the waterfall.

I arrived at Bassi Falls at about sunrise. It was crazy flow. Awesome roaring snow melt. I have seen Bassi Falls at much higher flows in prior years, but I am not sure it is going to get any better this year. As I said, I think we are already past peak flow. We’ll see if I am right. Maybe we will still get a lot more rain.

I moved up the left side this time, trying to get a closer shot of the waterfall, and waded through the freezing cold creek to find this little pool for the foreground. I think there are better angles for Bassi Falls, but I think this one works all right. I was just trying something different.

Now I had to boogie back to the car and drive to the church for that meeting. As I said, I planned everything perfectly, and I almost made it in time. Except for the stupid McDonald’s where I stopped to get some breakfast. I had to wait 15 minutes for my food! Unbelievable. That made me 10 minutes late for the meeting. Sigh. Well, at least I was forgiven. 🙂