Hiking Rancheria Falls
Aug. 21st, 2025 09:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
canyonwalkerKaiser Pass travelog #5
Above Huntington Lake · Sat, 9 Aug 2025, 5pm
Update: This journal entry got stuck in my backlog for a few weeks as other trips leapfrogged it. Time to get it unstuck!
We've had a day of driving up in the High Sierra, starting with the climb up from Fresno, a 4x4 trek up to nearly 10,000' in the Kaiser Pass, and a soak at Mono Hot Springs deep in the mountains. Now we're on our way back out, but in a way we've saved the best for last. Coming back down from the Kaiser Pass we've made a slight detour to Rancheria Falls.
Rancheria Falls is surprisingly large for how high up in the mountains it is— elev. 7,750' (2,362 meters). It's also surprisingly full for the date being somewhat late in the season. Though it was even fuller we first visited two years ago. And that was even later in the season by a few weeks. (The difference was a heavier rain/snow season earlier in the year.)
One thing that's also surprising is how hard the easy trail to the falls is. I call it "easy" because it's just 0.6 mile (1km) each way, with an ascent of 200' on the way in. That should be relatively easy. But at nearly 8,000' elevation, when you're not acclimated, it'll leave you panting. Fortunately the payoff is well worth the effort, with a falls you can not only admire from a distance but walk right to the foot of and dunk your head under if you do a bit of scrambling.
One advantage of saving this hike until late in the day is that we minimized the crowds. There were a bunch of people starting the trail just in front of us and at the falls when we arrived, but as we waited a bit most of the groups cleared out. At one point we had the falls entirely to ourselves for several minutes.
Another advantage of timing late in the day is the position of the sun. When we visited in the late morning hours on our previous visit, the sun was shining over the top of the falls. That made capturing really good photos hard. Of course, hard doesn't mean impossible. I'm proud of the photos I made on our visit in 2023. Today, though, in late afternoon, it's been a lot easier. I'll share more photos after these few soon.
Oh, one last quick one for now....
In the video I mentioned that Rancheria Falls is actually quite tall with lots of cascades. When you add them all together it's actually hundreds of feet tall. That top cascade about 80' tall is the prettiest one.
Above Huntington Lake · Sat, 9 Aug 2025, 5pm
Update: This journal entry got stuck in my backlog for a few weeks as other trips leapfrogged it. Time to get it unstuck!
We've had a day of driving up in the High Sierra, starting with the climb up from Fresno, a 4x4 trek up to nearly 10,000' in the Kaiser Pass, and a soak at Mono Hot Springs deep in the mountains. Now we're on our way back out, but in a way we've saved the best for last. Coming back down from the Kaiser Pass we've made a slight detour to Rancheria Falls.
Rancheria Falls is surprisingly large for how high up in the mountains it is— elev. 7,750' (2,362 meters). It's also surprisingly full for the date being somewhat late in the season. Though it was even fuller we first visited two years ago. And that was even later in the season by a few weeks. (The difference was a heavier rain/snow season earlier in the year.)
One thing that's also surprising is how hard the easy trail to the falls is. I call it "easy" because it's just 0.6 mile (1km) each way, with an ascent of 200' on the way in. That should be relatively easy. But at nearly 8,000' elevation, when you're not acclimated, it'll leave you panting. Fortunately the payoff is well worth the effort, with a falls you can not only admire from a distance but walk right to the foot of and dunk your head under if you do a bit of scrambling.
One advantage of saving this hike until late in the day is that we minimized the crowds. There were a bunch of people starting the trail just in front of us and at the falls when we arrived, but as we waited a bit most of the groups cleared out. At one point we had the falls entirely to ourselves for several minutes.
Another advantage of timing late in the day is the position of the sun. When we visited in the late morning hours on our previous visit, the sun was shining over the top of the falls. That made capturing really good photos hard. Of course, hard doesn't mean impossible. I'm proud of the photos I made on our visit in 2023. Today, though, in late afternoon, it's been a lot easier. I'll share more photos after these few soon.
Oh, one last quick one for now....
In the video I mentioned that Rancheria Falls is actually quite tall with lots of cascades. When you add them all together it's actually hundreds of feet tall. That top cascade about 80' tall is the prettiest one.
