Cedar Creek Falls, part 2
Sep. 7th, 2023 10:11 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerNorth Cascades Travelog #9
Mazama, WA - Sun, 3 Sep 2023, 2pm.
On Sunday we made hiking the Cedar Creek Falls trail our main event for the day. The hike up the trail was about 2 miles of walking with 500-600' of elevation gain, leading to a lovely set of waterfalls.
In my previous blog (link above) I shared a photo of the first falls we saw. Moments later I discovered it's Middle Falls, as there are falls both above and below it. But before that, as I was stepping around on rocky perches overlooking the scene, I discovered that from a different angle Middle Falls actually has two chutes of water (photo above).
After rest at this vantage point for a few minutes I scrambled down to the rocks near the top of the falls. The view downstream was poor from there (I couldn't see much looking don) but the view upstream was beautiful. That's where I saw the upper falls.
The upper falls don't include a large drop like the middle falls, which I estimate to be 40' tall. The biggest drop in this cascade looks to be at most 10' tall. But the series of small falls form a pretty cascade. And the pool at the foot of the cascade is a nice swimming hole. A fellow hiker was enjoying wading around in it.
I might have joined for a swim except (a) I didn't bring a change of clothes and (b) the water was too cold. I learned (b) when I slipped on a wet rock snapping photos like the one above and got wet up to my knees and soaked my boots. Maybe I should have brought that change of clothes. đŸ¤£
Having seen the middle falls from atop a rocky perch and the upper falls from up close and personal (and wet) I scouted routes to see if I could get to the bottom of the middle falls. I found a steep trail with a forbidding looking 10' drop down some exposed boulders. As I looked at it more I realized it only looked forbidding and was totally within my ability to do. I headed down the rocks.
Hawk stayed at the top while I headed below. The rocks were easy enough for me to navigate because with longer arms and legs I could brace with hands and feet and lower myself down safely. Hawk doesn't have as long limbs so it would be tougher for her, and she wanted to avoid risk of twisting her back.
The steep dirt parts of the informal trail actually presented more chances of slipping than those sharp rocks. I made it down without a slip by being careful and using my hiking pole for added support. That's literally why I carry it! At the bottom of the middle falls I enjoyed a great view of the two chutes.
From the floor of this part of the canyon I could look over the lower tier of the falls. Wow, they are big! But no way down from here, and the view peering over the precipice isn't great... unless you like vertigo. đŸ˜… Instead I came back up out of the canyon, rejoined Hawk, and together we went looking for a perch from which to see the lower falls.
Finding such a perch wasn't hard. There are "use trails" all around the area; little unofficial footpaths created by all the people who visited before us. We both enjoyed views of the lower falls, over 80' tall, from a perch up on the canyon wall.
Could we have gotten to the bottom of these falls? I will say "yes, we could..." because another hiker there at the same time did so. But she scrambled down a ravine where the trail was at about 60°. That was way too much of a falling risk for Hawk and too much even for me (the hiker who went down was very young and spry) so we stayed up here and appreciated them from above.
During our time at these various falls the sky turned from partly blue to all gray. A bit of it was smoke hanging in the sky from the fires burning in the high mountains to the west; but most of it was thicker clouds moving in.
When you're looking around in nature, your irises can widen or narrow your pupils to adjust for an enormous range of brightness. A camera's iris gets one setting to capture a picture. In addition there are limits to the range of brightness the digital image can represent. In bright sun things like water tend to get "blown out" to full white when you set the exposure to see what's in shaded areas. Set the exposure for the water, and the shaded areas are murky black. Under grayer light, though, the light and dark areas are closer in brightness value so it's easier to capture them both visually in a single picture.
Stay tuned to see what we see next!
Mazama, WA - Sun, 3 Sep 2023, 2pm.
On Sunday we made hiking the Cedar Creek Falls trail our main event for the day. The hike up the trail was about 2 miles of walking with 500-600' of elevation gain, leading to a lovely set of waterfalls.
In my previous blog (link above) I shared a photo of the first falls we saw. Moments later I discovered it's Middle Falls, as there are falls both above and below it. But before that, as I was stepping around on rocky perches overlooking the scene, I discovered that from a different angle Middle Falls actually has two chutes of water (photo above).
After rest at this vantage point for a few minutes I scrambled down to the rocks near the top of the falls. The view downstream was poor from there (I couldn't see much looking don) but the view upstream was beautiful. That's where I saw the upper falls.
The upper falls don't include a large drop like the middle falls, which I estimate to be 40' tall. The biggest drop in this cascade looks to be at most 10' tall. But the series of small falls form a pretty cascade. And the pool at the foot of the cascade is a nice swimming hole. A fellow hiker was enjoying wading around in it.
I might have joined for a swim except (a) I didn't bring a change of clothes and (b) the water was too cold. I learned (b) when I slipped on a wet rock snapping photos like the one above and got wet up to my knees and soaked my boots. Maybe I should have brought that change of clothes. đŸ¤£
Having seen the middle falls from atop a rocky perch and the upper falls from up close and personal (and wet) I scouted routes to see if I could get to the bottom of the middle falls. I found a steep trail with a forbidding looking 10' drop down some exposed boulders. As I looked at it more I realized it only looked forbidding and was totally within my ability to do. I headed down the rocks.
Hawk stayed at the top while I headed below. The rocks were easy enough for me to navigate because with longer arms and legs I could brace with hands and feet and lower myself down safely. Hawk doesn't have as long limbs so it would be tougher for her, and she wanted to avoid risk of twisting her back.
The steep dirt parts of the informal trail actually presented more chances of slipping than those sharp rocks. I made it down without a slip by being careful and using my hiking pole for added support. That's literally why I carry it! At the bottom of the middle falls I enjoyed a great view of the two chutes.
From the floor of this part of the canyon I could look over the lower tier of the falls. Wow, they are big! But no way down from here, and the view peering over the precipice isn't great... unless you like vertigo. đŸ˜… Instead I came back up out of the canyon, rejoined Hawk, and together we went looking for a perch from which to see the lower falls.
Finding such a perch wasn't hard. There are "use trails" all around the area; little unofficial footpaths created by all the people who visited before us. We both enjoyed views of the lower falls, over 80' tall, from a perch up on the canyon wall.
Could we have gotten to the bottom of these falls? I will say "yes, we could..." because another hiker there at the same time did so. But she scrambled down a ravine where the trail was at about 60°. That was way too much of a falling risk for Hawk and too much even for me (the hiker who went down was very young and spry) so we stayed up here and appreciated them from above.
During our time at these various falls the sky turned from partly blue to all gray. A bit of it was smoke hanging in the sky from the fires burning in the high mountains to the west; but most of it was thicker clouds moving in.
Photographic Aside
While gray skies are kind of a bummer for enjoying the great outdoors, they're a bit of a secret boon to photographers. It's easier to balance areas of light and shadow when the light is dimmer. That's because a camera can't capture as much of a range of brightness as the human eye can appreciate.When you're looking around in nature, your irises can widen or narrow your pupils to adjust for an enormous range of brightness. A camera's iris gets one setting to capture a picture. In addition there are limits to the range of brightness the digital image can represent. In bright sun things like water tend to get "blown out" to full white when you set the exposure to see what's in shaded areas. Set the exposure for the water, and the shaded areas are murky black. Under grayer light, though, the light and dark areas are closer in brightness value so it's easier to capture them both visually in a single picture.
Three-fer, Four-fer?
After a while we decided to head back down the trail. The gray clouds mounting overhead suggested that it could rain soon. Not wanting to get caught on the mountain trail in the rain was one reason to head back down. But an even bigger reason was we actually have two more trails on our list we'd like to hike today. Those will make it a three-fer— or even a four-fer if you count our car-touring in the Washington Pass this morning.Stay tuned to see what we see next!
