Leon Turnbull Photography

Many years ago someone told me about a waterfall on the North Fork Cosumnes River, but he was extremely vague about its location. Nonetheless, at that time, I went down to explore the area where he had told me to go, and searched the river up and down and found nothing, except for a 5 foot high falls. I figured that was all she wrote, as has happened often before when people tell me about waterfalls which are not waterfalls at all. A 5 foot drop is not a waterfall people! Indeed, my wife just recently showed me a picture of a little so-called waterfall where she took a photo of our daughter. It is a beautiful photo, but it is not a waterfall! Yet she insisted it was.

Well, fast forward to this summer. As I explored Google Earth during the off season, as I always do, I discovered what seemed to be a potentially big waterfall drop on the same river. I decided to check it out. This would be a scouting mission for the spring, because I was not expecting the waterfall to be flowing too much in mid October. As it happens, it was very close to where my friend had told me about many years before. Could this be what he was referring to after all? I suppose it is possible, but I am thinking not. This waterfall was extremely well hidden, with very difficult and cliffy access. It was no cakewalk, and I saw no evidence that people were ever down here before. I only saw a bear trail along the cliff side (and why they would be going down here, I have absolutely no idea).

I tried to get here last week but failed miserably. It was pretty easy to get to the top of the waterfall, but you cannot view the falls from there. I tried to get to the bottom, but there was no way. There was a cliff ledge on the other side of the river across from the falls. If I could get there, then maybe, just maybe, I could view the waterfall, but crossing the river at the top of the falls was not an option. It was not because of the flow in the river, but because of the cliffs on the other side. This is one crazy location. The waterfall is tucked in between these cliffs on both sides of the river, and it was not going to give up its views very easily. The only possibility I saw was to approach it from the top, on the other side. I would have to come back another day to try that, but I did not have much hope. It looked extremely steep and cliffy.

I tried again the next week. No surprise, the descent from the other side was crazy steep. The drop-offs were severe. The waterfall, as I said, is extremely well hidden, especially from this other side. You cannot see the falls, or even see where it is located. I could not see the cliff ledge that I wanted to get to either, as it is also hidden. I definitely did not want to approach the river above or below the waterfall because I would be cliffed out and then have to backtrack. As I got closer to the river, I finally saw some clues to where I should be, and then finally got a view of that hidden ledge. I used my rope to be safe, and lo and behold, and shockingly, I found a way down onto that cliff ledge. From there, I was looking down on the waterfall, and I could see the entire drop, a beautiful 47 ft. high falls in two tiers. I was standing on the very edge of the cliff to get this view. What a sweet view. Now THIS is a waterfall. I will definitely be returning here in the spring when the river is much higher.

Ansel Adams Wilderness, Eastern Sierra Nevada backpacking- Sep 2018. An amazing 3 day adventure into the Minarets at Devils Postpile National Monument, Inyo National Forest at Mammoth Lakes. I saw so may beautiful waterfalls, magnificent lakes, and stunning vistas: Upper Minaret Falls, Minaret Lake, Cecile Lake, Iceberg Lake, Ediza Lake Falls, Ediza Lake, Shadow Lake, Shadow Creek Falls, Shadow Lake Falls. Wow. The scenery was absolutely incredible. The descent from Cecile down to Iceberg Lakes was very treacherous and slow going. We called it the WALL OF DEATH. Yikes. Join me on this remarkable backpacking adventure.

I woke. It was two hours before sunrise. The wind had picked up enormously. It was not shaking my tent much, but it still kept me awake for those two hours. At sunrise, I got up, I packed up camp, and ate my breakfast. It would be another fairly long hike to my next destination, Llewellyn Falls. I have not been to this falls before. It is one you could do as a day hike if you wanted, but it is way off the beaten path from civilization, and that is why I had not been out to it yet. Plus it is not particularly big. A long way to go for a small waterfall. But as I was in the area seeing Carson Falls, a second night spent at Llewellyn Falls was a good plan.

I left camp at about 8AM. I hiked through Bear Alley. I saw no bears. Bummer.

I hiked all the way back on the same trail to Silver King Creek … along the East Carson River, crossing the East Carson River, past Soda Springs Ranger station, up the massive 1000 ft. hill from the river, and back to the junction of the trail to Llewellyn Falls at Silver King Creek. Silver King Creek had more flow than the East Carson River. This is strange. I could rock hop across the river, but nothing doing at this creek. I had to wade across. The water was up to my shins, and it was FREEZING cold. The creek seemed more like spring than autumn. From there I still have 4 miles up the valley. It is an enormously long valley. It seemed to never end, and it took quite a long time to hike that 4 miles (it was probably more like 8 miles – well, it seemed like that anyway). It was also very flat. Surely no waterfalls could live here. Finally I arrived at the end of the flat never ending valley, turned the corner, and climbed up the short hill. I was now close to the waterfall. A trail sign indicated an off shoot path over to the waterfall. I sure hoped there would be a campsite there. I was even more concerned there would not be any here (more so than at Carson). No need to worry. There were a few nice ones at the top of the falls, and an easy way to get down to the creek for water.

In the evening, I went down to the waterfall. It is not particularly impressive, only about 25 ft. high and that is including the upper cascades. Still, it is nice to visit once. I had to cross the creek to photograph the waterfall, which was difficult because the creek was flowing rather swift below the falls. To see all the tiers, I had to climb up the cliff on the other side. This was not bad. Crossing the creek was much trickier.
So I made it to the two waterfalls that I wanted to in Carson Iceberg Wilderness. Success. I just had a short hike the next day back to the trailhead. Except …

DAY 3.

I was FROZEN solid in the night. Cue the song. Well, maybe I was not frozen solid, but my water shoes were certainly frozen solid. I was FREEZING solid. The temperature was surely 10 degrees colder than the first night. I screwed up. I only checked the weather forecast at Carson Falls beforehand. I figured Llewellyn would be about the same. It is slightly higher in elevation but only 10 miles away. It surely could not be more than a couple degrees colder. Wrong. I guessed it was around 35-37 degrees the second night, and I did not pack enough warm clothes because I figured it would not be that cold. The first night at Carson, I was toasty, but the second night at Llewellyn not so much. I had all my clothes on me and in my 17 degree bag, but I was still cold. If I had just checked the weather forecast properly, I am sure I would have brought more clothes and would have been very fine. In the morning I awoke at sunrise, got up and packed. It was tough to do this because of the temperature. I should have just stayed in my sleeping bag another hour or so but I could not sleep anymore anyway. Mostly it was just my hands that were so cold. I did not bring my gloves. Lesson learned. Once the sun came out though, I warmed up very quickly. It was a good hike back to my car, and a wonderful 3 days in the Carson Iceberg Wilderness.

It was my last backpacking trip of the season. I suppose that is not saying much because October 1 marks the start of the new season! The new waterfall season that is (the only season that matters). Indeed, we may have our first storm of the season next week. Anyhow, it will no doubt be awhile before my next backpacking trip. Winter is coming. The weather has been splendid the entire month of September (for backpacking), and this was my third trip of the month. This time around: Carson Iceberg Wilderness. I think I have hiked in this Wilderness before, but not backpacked. My goal: to reach mysterious Carson Falls. I have only seen a couple photos of this waterfall before, and they were not good ones. They made it seem like Carson Falls is pretty much un-viewable, and I would not have been surprised to find it that way. Instead, I found glory. But before that…

I arrived at the trailhead on the Eastern Sierra Nevada side, and was hiking by 8:45am. A tad late, but not bad. A sign at the trailhead indicated that bears in this area are habituated to humans, un-afraid, and eager to get your food by all possible means. That is not a good sign.

After climbing up 500 ft. to the top of a ridge, the views open up tremendously. The landscape is magnificent. The fall colors are already starting to shine (it is still very early in the Fall season, but they are already close to peak). The scenery is much different here than say, Ansel Adams Wilderness, but still astoundingly beautiful. The beautiful yellow and orange Aspens really upped the ante of the beauty. It was stunning, and I took a lot of video, which thus slowed my pace considerably, but I was not too concerned. Until…

Once I crossed Silver King Creek, the trail to Carson Falls heads off westwards. I did not see any trail westwards. According to my USGS map, it should be immediate after crossing the creek. Not so. I bushwhacked a bit, eventually getting back on the proper trail. I realized I should have continued up Silver King Creek a bit more to the marked trail junction, but how would I know that based on my map. From here, the trail goes all the way to the East Fork Carson River. Again, my map showed a trail down to Soda Springs Ranger station along the river, but there was no such trail. I continued on the main (obvious) trail, but this new route would add a lot of mileage to my trip that was not planned. Finally down at river level, I stopped at Poison Creek to filter some water. Thankfully, the water was clear and not poisonous – if it was poisonous, my Sawyer squeeze handled it nicely. Here, I met the only other backpacker I saw all weekend (except I did see some horseback riders the next day). He was an older guy, he was not very talkative, but he said he came from Wolf Creek and would be camping somewhere along the East Carson River. I think it is quite a trek coming from Wolf Creek, so he must be doing good, and he was a lot older than the geezer writing this blog.

After crossing the East Fork Carson River – which I rock hopped across – though it was a bit hard to do that – the trail was once again lost to my senses. Eventually, I found it again and continued up the river … until I lost it again … until I then found it again. As you may be able to tell, the trail is not all that well traveled. Not many people hike this section of the trail, I think especially from Soda Springs to Carson Falls. Once on the trail, it was easy to follow. It is just those few times where it was very indistinct or missing. In other words, this section took much longer to hike than anticipated. In addition to this…

There is a 2 mile section along the river here which we shall affectionately call “Bear Alley”. I saw more bear scat along the trail here than I have seen in my entire life combined. Maybe not quite. If not, then it is very close. I am not kidding. Every 20 paces, bear scat. Every 10 paces, more bear scat. The closer I got to Carson Falls, the more prevalent it became. Every 5 paces, more bear scat. Most of it was not fresh, but some of it certainly was. This was not made by one bear. A family of bears. Angry momma, and her five adorable children. Let’s not forget perturbed papa bear. And probably grumpy grandpa bear too. You would think that with all the bear scat, I would see some bears on this trip. No such luck. I was looking for them. I was hoping to see one, but I did not see any bears, or any other wildlife either. I think I saw an eagle, but it was too far away to be certain. Nothing else was seen (not counting birds and squirrels).

As I approached closer to Carson Falls, the trail once again disappeared. Actually, it just seemed to end very abruptly and succinctly. Now what? It was late in the day, too late to go back. There must be a way to get over to Carson Falls. I started to bushwhack over towards it. Nothing doing. After a long bit of searching, I finally did find the proper trail over to it. It was very easy to miss it (I did miss it!), and again, my map showed something very different than actuality.

I hoped that there would be a campsite close to Carson Falls with access to the river, but I was not certain. It seemed pretty cliffy in that area, but fortunately, I found a great spot a short distance above the falls, and yes, one and only one spot where I could get down to the river. No bear scat in the immediate vicinity of the campsite. Awesome. It was 3:30pm when I arrived. I had hoped to get here by 12:30pm, and then do another hike in the afternoon up to Golden Canyon. There was now no time for that. I was way too tired and it was way too late. I wisely just stayed at Carson Falls for the rest of the afternoon and evening.

After setting up camp and making dinner, I proceeded down to the waterfall. There was a steep path to the bottom, and I started down it, but quickly balked. This was way too steep and dangerous. With a rope, it possibly would have been do-able, but I had no rope. I did not think I’d be able to see much from the bottom anyway. Instead, I climbed up onto a large protruding cliff overlook. This was not “too dangerous” except for the big huge drop-offs, but it provided a glorious view of Carson Falls, and I could see all three magnificent tiers of the waterfall (mostly). I really really really enjoyed this waterfall. It is very beautiful. At higher flows, it would be even more spectacular, but in late September it was still glorious.