Meet Upper Bear Ranch Creek Falls, 112 ft. high. It took me four tries to get here and I was absolutely ecstatic that I finally made it.
I was in the area the prior week trying to get to this waterfall but it was an epic fail. After the Bear Fire in 2020 the brush has grown up tremendously. This route was now impassable. Before the fire I think this might have been a good route. Now, not a chance. Somehow while whacking through all the bushes I lost my Garmin Inreach. I was so mad at myself. I did not have it securely attached to my person and it fell off into the brush. I retraced my steps exactly but did not find it. Back at the top of the mountain, I had cell service so I called my wife and asked her to ping the device, which she did but there was no response. I figured it must be under some trees or logs and now is lost forever. Once I got back home I tried pinging it again. It was the same thing my wife did but this time I got a response! Now I had a location where it was and I could go back sometime and get it. But time was running out. Once it snowed I would not be able to go back until spring and snow was in the forecast for the next week. I literally had just one day to go back there, Sunday on my way home from visiting family up north for Thanksgiving weekend.
It would not be a difficult hike to go back. I figured just 6 miles round trip and 300 ft. of elevation gain. Thankfully it was not at the bottom of the canyon. I did not want to just go back to do this one hike, however. I decided to do a second hike first to another waterfall. I was not planning on Upper Bear Ranch Creek again, I was planning a different (easier) hike, but that also turned out to be far too brushy and impassable. Well …. what to do now?
I thought about taking a different route to Upper Bear Ranch Creek Falls. Perhaps it would not be as brushy. Heck, why not? I had all day. The new route was not so brushy, however, it was very steep and very cliffy. I had to be very careful in some spots. I got most of the way down the canyon and came to the top of a cliff. I thought I was done. I decided to just check out one more spot to see if it was passable and lo and behold, I was able to continue! Past the final cliff, I could forge on all the way down to the creek and to the waterfall. I was in shock that I actually made it down all the cliffs. I was in awe at the beauty of this majestic waterfall. I was so happy you have no idea. This one has been a long time in the making. I do not know of anyone else that has been here before.
I climbed back up the mountain 1700 ft. in elevation and back to my car. I was very tired but I still had a second hike to go retrieve my Garmin. Thankfully someone had cleared the fallen logs across the road and now I could drive much of it. Instead of a 6 mile hike it was more like 3 miles. I easily made it down to the area where the device was pinged. I could not see it. It was not in the exact location where it was supposed to be. I searched the area for about 20 minutes. I could not see it. Multiple passes. Praying fervently. I decided to make one last pass and then I saw it! I must have walked by it at least once without seeing the thing. I was so happy! Woo hoo! Thank you, Lord!
It was a fantastic day to see this amazing waterfall in Plumas National Forest.
Black Friday. Best day of the year to go shopping. Not! Best day of the year to go hiking. Absolutely! Journey and I were up again very early. This time: Whiskeytown Lake. It has been a long time since I’ve been to Boulder Creek Falls (15 years). It was closed after the Carr Fire of 2018 but is open now finally. I thought a return trip with Journey would be perfect. I could not get to the traditional trailhead. According to the park website, South Shore Dr. is now open. It was not open. How was I supposed to get to Boulder Creek Falls now? I knew the trail was open. Did I have to go on S. Shore Dr. from the other side? Honestly, I am not sure. However, I saw a sign for Boulder Creek Falls trailhead on this side of the lake. Weird. This was not the traditional route. I looked at my map and it seemed like it was possible to get to the waterfall from this side, and it looked to be about the same amount of mileage and elevation gain. OK then. Let’s hike!
It was a relatively easy, straightforward hike. Perhaps not as nice because a lot of it was on a road. At the end, there was one big boulder that Journey could not jump up so I had to lift her. And then there was a very narrow, rocky section along the creek. She did great. We arrived at the falls. It was flowing fairly nice, just about what I expected. I took some photos. Journey again waited patiently. The path to the upper waterfalls looked to be very overgrown and steep, and I did not really feel like going up there. Neither did Journey. We skipped it and hiked back.
Boulder Creek Falls is somewhat interesting now. First, it is a lot more photogenic than it used to be. A lot of the branches and logs in the waterfall are gone. Two, there used to be a bench to sit on but it’s long gone (a Carr Fire tragedy?). Three, the trail to the upper Falls used to be very nice but now it is overgrown and difficult to even see. Four, the trail I went on is a new trail. It is much shorter and easier than the traditional route. That is, if the road is open (which it wasn’t for me although I think it is open in the summer).
As soon as I got Journey back in the car, she immediately laid down and closed her eyes. She was completely pooped out from the hike. I was surprised. It was about the same distance hike as the previous day with just a little more elevation gain. I got her a hamburger. She perked up a bit for that but then slept when we got back to the house. She had an awesome but very tiring day at Whiskeytown Lake.
Thanksgiving Day. I was on my way up north to visit family and I had Journey with me. The plan was to get in a morning hike before Thanksgiving dinner. To the waterfall with 100 names: Fairy Falls, Shingle Falls, Dry Creek Falls, Beale Falls. We arrived at the trailhead 30 minutes late. It was Journey’s fault but she is so cute, I cannot be mad at her. However, we had to run down the trail to make up time. No time to smell the flowers. I promised her she could smell them all on the way back when we could take it slow (and she did).
We got to the upper Falls in time. I took some photos. It was not flowing too great but it was all right. When I was here with my previous dog, Kaya, many years ago, we tried to get down to the bottom at the upper waterfall. Kaya could not do it. Kaya was a master at steep rock scrambling, so I knew if she could not do it, there is no way Journey could do it and I did not even try. However, Kaya was able to get down to the bottom of the lower Falls. I hoped Journey would be able to, however, it was much steeper than I expected. She did not want to and I did not want to force her. There was another path down to the bottom, however, and Journey was able to get down this way even though it was quite steep as well. Excellent job, Journey! The problem was that you cannot see the waterfall from this location, but I could see it if I scrambled up on the rocks. So that is what I did. Again, I left Journey safely, and she could see me the entire time. She waited in perfect patience for me as I took photos of the lower falls. She was very awesome.
We took our time hiking back. She smelled all the flowers. And all the dog poop as well. We saw one other guy with his dog and then a huge group of people. We made it in time for Thanksgiving dinner. It was a great morning at Fairy Falls.
I realized that most of the hikes on my list now are very difficult ones. I have done pretty much all the easy ones. All that is left are ones with cliffs, steep rocky terrain, river crossings, etc. to negotiate. Our new puppy Journey cannot do these types of hikes.
Yet I want to take Journey on many hikes to waterfalls in the future (or even without waterfalls). So I have started making a second list now. Hikes that I have done before which I know are easy enough for her to do. I will be revisiting waterfalls that I have seen before once or maybe multiple times. At the same time (not exactly the same time – ha ha) I will also be continuing the hikes by myself which are more difficult. Ch-ch-changes are in the air for me.
First on the list: American Canyon Creek Falls. I chose this one first very intentionally as I will explain shortly. It is a fairly easy hike down the trail until you get to the waterfall. There are ticks and poison oak, but in November, there is none of that. Good thing I chose November for this one, otherwise she would have picked up a bunch of the little beasts (although she still did manage to get a couple of them on her – ugh). Of course the creek is also low in November and it has not rained much yet, but I figured it would still be all right.
The first new thing I learned about Journey: She doesn’t care about horse poop or bear poop, only dog poop. There was plenty of all three on the trail and she completely ignored the first two. The second thing is this: she is quite scared of going down steep rocky terrain. Of course she has not ever done this before and hopefully she will get a lot better with it. The last part down to the creek is quite steep and she would not go down. She would also not let me carry her. She did manage to get down one steep part but then could not get back up afterwards so I had to lift her back up. Anyway there is no way she could get down to the creek level. This is what I suspected would happen and this is the big reason why I came here. I wanted to see how she would do, while waiting for me to take my photos. I tied her up in a safe spot and then went down to the creek, crossed it, and took photos. She could see me the entire time and she sat down and waited for me with perfect patience! She was absolutely very awesome. I was proud of her. I took my photos quickly and went back up to her.
You will notice that there is now a big new rock embedded in the middle of the waterfall. Well this is a big change. Ugh. This definitely has ruined the prior character that this waterfall once had but it creates a new character for it. Is it better or worse? Well I definitely liked the old character much better, but I admit it is still interesting and I think at higher flows it will even be more interesting.
We hiked back up the trail to the car and went home. I don’t even think Journey was very tired. She wanted to play fetch with mom as soon as we got back home (after she ate her hamburger, of course).
When my wife asked me how my toe was earlier in the week I said it was very good and about 95% healed. I think it was the next day, all of a sudden I was having a very bad day. It was not 95%. It was more like 75%. Not good. I did not bang it or anything so why is it hurting so much again? And I had a very tough hike planned for the weekend.
Well by the time the weekend came around it was feeling better so the hike was back on as planned. Except the weather forecasters messed me up. It was not supposed to start raining until 10AM. All the forecasts I checked said it would start 10AM at the earliest, but it was already raining when I woke up in the morning. And it had already rained during the night. Oh come on people. You cannot even get the forecast right when it is just a few hours in advance??
This forecasting error turned out to be a bigger problem than I anticipated. The problem was that the rocks were extremely slippery and dangerous. I made it down to the river. My plan had been to attempt to walk down the river to the waterfall. I did not know if it would work or not, however, I didn’t even make it a quarter mile downstream. It was just too dangerous. I had to retreat back up the mountain. If it had not rained (as it was supposed to) then I am sure I could have made it a lot further. I will return again.
Back at the car it was still cloudy. I decided to go on an easy hike to North Fork Falls, which I have done many times before. For my toe’s sake I went the easy way (from the campground). This meant I had to cross the river at the waterfall. Not a problem except for those very slippery rocks. I made it over safely and to the waterfall overlook. It was a gloomy day in Tahoe National Forest.
