canyonwalker: My other car is a pair of hiking boots (in beauty I walk)
canyonwalker ([personal profile] canyonwalker) wrote2024-08-09 07:01 am

A Visit to Hedge Creek Falls

Two weekends ago we drove to northern California to enjoy hiking in the Trinity Wilderness northwest of Mt. Shasta. As I've written in several blogs recently, we had to contend with smoke from the enormous Park Fire blazing near Chico— plus smoke drifting down from fires in southern Oregon. 🥵 The latter caused us to cancel our plans to hike in the Trinity Alps Sunday, even after we hiked there comfortably on Saturday, so instead we picked a pair of shorter hikes further south.... in between the clouds of smoke from the various fires.

Hedge Creek Falls in Dunsmuir, California (Jul 2024)One of those hikes was a short walk to an old favorite, Hedge Creek Falls. It's just off I-5 in Dunsmuir, a tiny town between Mt. Shasta and Shasta Lake. In the past when we've visited it's been a hidden gem. Typically we shared the trail with just a few other groups. But on this particular Sunday two weeks ago there were more than 20 cars parked at the trailhead.

Hedge Creek Falls in Dunsmuir, California (Jul 2024)

The crowds don't make the falls less pretty. Well, not until over-visitation by careless people trashes the place. 🙄 Thankfully that hasn't happened here... yet.

Hedge Creek Falls in Dunsmuir, California (Jul 2024)

We stayed at the falls for a while, at least twice as long as any of the other visits. We watched two or three sets cycle in and out. I had fun making slow-exposure photos with my nice camera and tripod— even though I'd lost one of my lenses in an Alpine swamp the day before. You can see two of the motion blur pictures above. Here's a short video I made:



In beauty I walk.


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