Waterfall

Lesser side of Mount Baker

Jul 04

If you’ve visited my photo galleries, you will notice that Mount Baker (and the Mount Baker area in general) is a favorite subject of mine. The vast majority of Mount Baker compositions are taken either from the north or from the south. The west side is seldom seen and for a good reason- access to viewpoints is severely challenged. While a forest service road (Road 38) provides some access to the area, the surrounding ridges and peaks largely lie in private ownership.

One day I was exploring the area with Google Earth and I found a ridge spine which seemed to offer a great view of the mountain without any logging activity in the foreground:

Even better, the spot looked to be a short hike via a decommissioned logging road. On this holiday weekend, I headed out with a friend to put boots on the ground and find out if the view lived up to my own hype. Before the actual hike, I made the brief side trip up the Clearwater Creek valley to show my friend the huge unnamed waterfall I discovered earlier in spring.

Full sun provided its natural challenges with shade and full sun in the same frame. I scrambled down to the creek’s edge to shoot the lowest tier of the waterfall which empties directly into Clearwater Creek. Fortunately, it was early enough in the day that this spot was still shaded by the steep canyon walls. This creek really holds some photographic promise but this brief introduction indicates it won’t give up its goods easily. Water’s edge is mostly bedrock with little to no margin for cross country travel. I might make another trip here later in the summer once the water levels subside a bit to spend the day.

Having reloaded back into my truck, we headed off and up the logging roads to our destination. The Middle Fork Nooksack River valley is nestled between Mount Baker and the Twin Sisters range. The higher you go, the better the views of the Twin Sisters become. The higher I went, the more neglected the road became. The alder alongside the roads became thicker and closed in. My truck received many new scratches thanks to the alders.

Just when the views of the Twin Sisters couldn’t get any better, Mount Baker finally came into view. The summit was wrapped in cloud but the Black Buttes were visible along with the Coleman and Thunder Glaciers. We arrived at what I determined to be our “trailhead” and we could see our destination only 0.7 miles directly across from us. The sun’s rays were heating up the day (hey- this part of the country hasn’t experienced warm weather for almost 260 days!) and after finding the best entry point, we dove into the forest to pick up the old logging road.

The road’s beginning was still fairly well defined thanks to its notching into a hillside. The upslope side still had a drainage ditch and the downslope side of the road dropped away. By the end of the day, we joked to ourselves that the best way to tell where the road was located was to look for one thing: Sitka Alder. It seemed to ONLY grow within the boundaries of the old roadbed. Where it grew, it grew thick and vertically straight (at least initially!).

The road had several culverts (which were removed and set aside on site) which created a series of small obstacle courses. Each crossing required climbing down and back up, all the while crawling over, under, and through alder and willows. Despite the constant slaps in the face by branches, I felt we made good progress. I was able to frequently check our progress using my Motion-X GPS app, which I had prepped for this outing my caching the aerial photos from our hike. This turned out to be a good thing because the ground conditions at times didn’t seem to coincide with what we saw on the ground.

About halfway out we crossed the one true creek in the area and the uphill began. At this point, I also ran out of flagging. Since there was no trail, I brought a bunch of pink flagging strips which I would periodically hang on alder branches to mark our route. I didn’t bring the entire roll with me and hoped that the route would become more obvious and not require flagging. It did break out into some open stretches but the groves of alder continued to dominate and hinder our travel.

After more brush, we reached an old road junction which signaled the start of our more strenuous ascent. My friend had been leading our incursion into the reclaiming forest and by this point, was starting to feel its cumulative effects. We slogged on until we met a junction with a slide path. We took an extended break as I consulted the GPS to determine where we were. I estimated that we could save some distance by traveling straight up the slide path (which joined the last road switchback) but it would obviously be more immediate elevation gain.

We decided to try it since it was clear travel in comparison to the alder slapfest we were enduring. About what we thought was halfway up, we could not definitively see the road switchback above us. I was feeling physically better so I huffed up the remaining distance to scout it. Huzzah! Success. I topped out onto the last road switchback and passed that fact on to my friend. He pressed on and soon enough joined me there. At this point he was really wiped out. I knew we were close so I told him I would press on the remaining distance. If I had a great view of Mount Baker (which I never really knew for certain I would), I was going to blow my emergency whistle four times……..

PEEP! PEEP! PEEP! PEEP!

I walked back towards the landing to blow my whistle again and make sure he heard me. I started to see some of the alder branches shake so I knew he was coming towards me. We strolled around the corner and began to enjoy the view:

Once again, the summit was capped by clouds but they were fluid. Shortly after setting up my gear and taking my first few shots, the clouds parted over the summit. It was a brief moment but one that was repeated several times during our stay. The view was tremendous and definitely was as good as what I had seen using Google Earth. Below us was the Warm Creek drainage and the creek has an impressive waterfall that drops about 250 feet. It added the perfect accent to the uniform forest in the lower left portion of my wide angle shots.

I had an obligation later in the evening and we were running behind schedule. As amazing as it was, we had to turn back. Lost in all of my narrative here is the amazing view of the Twin Sisters. Once again, this side of the Twin Sisters isn’t commonly seen. Before packing up for good, I spent a few minutes taking some photos:

The rewards were over and the tribulations began once again. Having flagged most of the route, it helped us on our return journey. Both of us were definitely stumbling around so we resorted to traveling from flag to flag. Despite the severe fatigue, we made good time on our journey back and in one glorious moment, crashed back out of the brush and onto the road where we parked hours before.

I would love to return to this spot in the future (although I think I might need to convince my friend to join me!). The big thing I learned from this outing was that this trip can’t SAFELY be done as a sunset or sunrise dayhike attempt. I can only imagine what kind of angle or knee sprain injury would be awaiting me while hiking in the dark. A nice campsite high up at the last road switchback exists but any water would have to be obtained at the lone creek crossing and hauled up to the campsite. All in all, a very successful discovery!

Lewis River Drainage

Jun 24

Before heading home from my mini-trip to Oregon, I made my first visit to the Lewis River area in the South Cascades of Washington State. Located just southeast of Mount Saint Helens, the Lewis River has a number of waterfalls (including a few that are over 150 feet in height) and forest diversity that has always intrigued me. Prior to my trip I had identified a number of locations to visit knowing full well that I probably wouldn’t be able to get to all of them. The weather forecast was for improving weather and sunshine and it turned out to be even nicer than the forecasts.

That’s great unless you’re trying to photograph waterfalls. There’s nothing you can really do about it except change your plans so that’s what I did. Vanilla leaf is much more common in the forests of the South Cascades and I’ve always wanted to do some macro-type photography of them. Just beyond the Forest Service Rd 90 / Rd 83 junction, I saw a roadside mass of vanilla leaf so I pulled over to check it out. Although it was most shaded by the forest, some of the leaves were being backlit by the morning’s sunshine.

The wind was calm, even with the occasional vehicle zipping by at 50 miles per hour, and this allowed me to keep my ISOs at a lower number. This batch of vanilla leaf still hadn’t bloomed but the leaf patterns were more than enough to keep me interested. After I was satisfied, I packed up and headed to my first and most desired stop: Curly Creek Falls. Before picking up an out of print roadside attraction guidebook, I had never heard of the falls which I find a little surprising considering how cool it is.

The falls are located just a couple miles upstream of the Swift Reservoir, and are the location where Curly Creek joins the Lewis River. What really makes this waterfall special is the natural arch located about halfway down it’s face. It’s a very rare sight and one I’ve been eager to view firsthand. My old guidebook describes a scramble down to the river and waterfall’s edge but I elected to NOT attempt this since the bright sunshine wasn’t going to give me optimal conditions. I opted to view the falls from the official viewpoint located along the opposite bank of the Lewis River. Lighting was tough but I managed to have a brief moment when a cloud blocked the sun.

Just up the hill and around the corner from the falls is the McClellan Viewpoint, which provides an unobstructed view of Mount Saint Helens to the northwest. About a quarter-mile to the northeast is Rush Creek and the site of one of those large waterfalls. Accessing the falls requires a bushwhack approach which I attempted but quickly had to turnaround due to a cliff dropoff. I was alone and decided to return some other time when I had a partner with me and better light.

Moving on, I did stop off where Rush Creek flows underneath Forest Service Road 90. The creek is quite large, almost river-like and quite photogenic upstream of the road. By now, the day was getting long and so I made my next stop my last: Big Creek Falls. At a height of 130 feet, the falls are impressive and easily accessed thanks in large part due to an interpretive loop trail. I actually had the entire place to myself which was great. The upper falls were still in full sun and the spray from the falls was throwing up a nice rainbow (sadly the rainbow could not be photographed due to its position).

The waterfall is impressive enough but the forest here has some really big old growth trees. Having done what I could with the falls, I explored the forest. Beyond the interpretive loop trail, another trail follows the canyon rim down towards the Lewis River. Eventually I had to turn back since I still had a 3+ hour drive back to the Seattle area. I barely was able to scratch the surface so I hope to return later this summer once the snowmelt water levels subside a bit.

Tamanawas and Mount Hood

Jun 20

After a day in the Gorge at Ruckel and Gorton Creeks, I spent the following day traveling around Mount Hood. My first destination was Tamanawas Falls which has been on my list for a year or two. Located on the east side of Mount Hood, the falls are an impressive 90 feet tall and plunge over a volcanic rock outcrop. The falls are also situated in a way that allows you to get behind them so that opens up some other compositional opportunities.

The unsettled weather from the previous day continued into the next and I found myself in rain while the sun shined in Hood River. The trailhead for Tamanawas Falls is located right along Highway 35 south of Hood River along the banks of the Hood River. Several miles outside of town, you are treated to your first full view of Mount Hood. Upon my first view, I found that the mountain was acting as a dam for the nasty weather located on the west side. The eastern flanks were basking in sunshine while the divide was being overwhelmed by creeping clouds.

The sunshine continued all the way to the trailhead. It was clear that the weather wasn’t going to be optimal for waterfall photography. The hike is a pleasant 2+ miles through forest alongside Cold Springs Creek. The forest is unique in that it’s a bit more airy than a west-side forest but it still contains the high diversity of plants that you do find on the west. The cold spring was still thwarting plant leaf out but I still managed to see trillium, fairy slipper, Oregon anemone, and lots of few flowered solomon’s seal.

This hike was a really a great discovery. The creek alongside the trail has a number of interesting scenes that warrant further exploration. The falls are large enough to throw a significant amount of spray so taking a photo of the falls can be a challenge. I admit that I must have been a pretty humorous site huddled behind an umbrella on a sunny day waiting for a quick break in the spray to take my photos.

After some initial photos from further away, I hiked down to the edge of the creek for some closer shots. The spray was more intense so getting any shots required more gymnastics. I had a couple brief moments of balanced light as an occasional cloud would block the sun. My next stop was up behind the waterfall. I had to travel directly through the main brunt of spray but it was nice & dry once I got closer to the falls.

The area behind the falls is a large amphitheater thanks to a seemingly endless supply of calving columnar volcanic rock. It’s very cool to see- until you look up and see all the cracks in the rock high above you. I admit- I got spooked out about spending a lot of time underneath the overhanging rock. I took my shots and quickly moved back out into the safety of the open skies. After reaching the trailhead, I packed my gear and headed for a placed called Brooks Meadow.

Clued into this location by a Oregon blogger, I wanted to visit to check out this 35 acre meadow located at roughly 4,000 feet and a little bit further east of Mount Hood. Sadly, what wasn’t mentioned in the blog post about the meadow is that it is located within the City of Dalles watershed and access is prohibited. Bummer. Looked like a neat spot! All was not completely lost because I spied a location on my drive up that looked to have a nice, commanding view of Mount Hood and the East Fork Hood River valley.

The clouds continued to thicken over the west slopes of Mount Hood and were continuing to provide dramatic conditions. I spent a fair amount of watching and taking photos before I had to leave. My last stop of the day was on the west side of Mount Hood and deep into the center of the bad weather- Lost Creek. Located within the Sandy River drainage, I was attracted to Lost Creek due to some photos of the waterfall that is present about 2 miles up the trail which continues on to Burnt Lake.

If Tamanawas Falls was a highlight then Lost Creek was a lowlight and disappointment. The creek was within earshot but just a little too far away and too much effort to be able to quickly pop off the trail and look for photo ops. Now throw in the fact that very little of anything has leafed out to this point and you get a fairly boring, lonely hike in the forest. Once I got to the falls, the second disappointment set in. The viewpoint of the falls is horrible- you’re standing right above them and there’s no safe way to access a better vantage point.

Had I known any of this, I probably would have skipped this one. Live and learn! The one thing that was pretty amazing about this trail was the unbelievable abundance of trillium. It almost reminded me of some of the displays of avalanche lilies you see at Mount Rainier. I think I will return to explore the Sandy River valley a little more since the forests do seem interesting.

Ruckel and Gorton Creek

Jun 11

Last week I made my annual pilgrimage south to the Columbia River Gorge and Mount Hood area of Oregon. I don’t need to spend a lot of time describing and praising this area- it has a reputation and a well deserved one for its amazing scenery. Despite holding out a few extra weeks this year, the Dog Mountain Balsamroot blooms just weren’t going to coincide with my visit. Rain and a much delayed spring convinced me to seek other destinations.

This year I finally had nice, cloudy skies (yes- I said it) so I ended up returning to Ruckel Creek. There is a trail that begins alongside the creek but it quickly climbs away from the creek. This leaves any exploration as off trail bushwhacking. It’s actually not that bad so long as you don’t mind getting your feet a little wet (or just wear some 16″ rubber boots). My first visit here was 2 years ago and on that day, I had lot of sunshine. I also did not have much time so my exploration was cut short.

Since this was somewhat of a last minute decision, I neglected to do additional research before heading down. My fuzzy memory was telling me that there should be another waterfall upstream a bit. Technically, I wasn’t wrong but it turns out that it’s much further upstream and I probably was expecting. Nonetheless, I had DRY weather and nice, even lighting so you can’t ask for much more!

I pushed upstream further but I saw no signs of a waterfall. I decided to stop at this particular spot where the creek had a nice sweeping arc around a moss covered log jam. It was a bit of a challenge to capture some of these scenes because I felt they needed a higher, downward looking perspective. In order to accomplish this, I had to stand up on logs or the stream bank and set up my tripod with the legs closer together (which isn’t completely stable)…

Once I got back to my truck at the Eagle Creek trailhead, I still had some time left in the late afternoon. I decided to head a little further east to something that’s been on my list for a few years but I’ve never been able to fit it in: Gorton Creek Falls. Starting at the Wyeth Campground, most of the hike to the 80 foot waterfall is pretty straightforward along an old roadbed. The last 100 yards require a lot of climbing up, around, and over boulders and stream bank along the left side of Gorton Creek to reach the base of the falls. I took my climb during the scramble part and did not find it too difficult. I would recommend caution because a slip a few locations would cause an injury of some sort and create a situation where rescue personnel might be needed to carry a person out. In a few minutes, I was at the base of the falls and enjoying the whole scene all to myself.

Bigma Fun

Mar 26

I recently ended a long quest to pick up my “wildlife”zoom lens. As a brand, Pentax has not kept up with developing long length zooms (or primes for that matter) for use in wildlife photography. The Pentax branded lenses out there hail from the end of the days of film and the FA series of lenses. For modern times, options are really limited to a few offerings made by third party lens developer Sigma.

Sigma has been producing their 500mm (750mm equivalent with the Pentax 1.5x crop) beasts for a while and their offerings boil down to the 150-500 or the 50-500, which is affectionately known as the “Bigma.” Based on my research, the 50-500 was held in high regard for both it’s image quality and value. The current version of this lens retails for about $1600 in a Pentax mount and uses a HSM motor for focusing. Pentax’s own lenses with HSM motors have been suspect so I wanted to avoid this and target a used copy of the previous version of this lens (the 50-500mm F4-6.3 APO DG).

I thought I had scored a deal on one using eBay but the seller had mistakenly listed their Nikon mount lens as a Pentax mount.There’s nothing worse than opening a box and realizing the lens you see won’t fit your camera! Anyways, fast forward a few weeks and I found an individual selling their one year old Bigma for $825 on a Pentax forum. For an additional $50, the seller threw in a UV and Polarizer filter so I jumped on it.

I’m not really a wildlife photographer but occasionally find myself in those kind of situations. What’s more, there have been a few times when I knew that the extra length beyond my normal 300mm tele would have yielded a much stronger composition and image. I’ve wanted to take this lens out for a spin but haven’t had the time until a few days ago. I tried stopping by the Mosquito Lake Rd bridge over the North Fork Nooksack River but there wasn’t a single Bald Eagle to be found. If I was going to use this lens, it would have to be landscapes.

Before that, however, I stopped briefly at Nooksack Falls. I hoped to get a “wintertime” counterpart to my ladder-aided shot of Nooksack Falls from last summer. To my disappointment, much of the snow that fell a couple weeks ago has melted away..

After that, I continued up the Mount Baker Highway to hit the slopes at the Mount Baker Ski Area. The skies were partly sunny with clouds drifting in and around the neighboring peaks. Perfect for dramatic photos! I decided to only use the Bigma so all of these photos were taken with the 50-500 and a UV filter:

I’m really happy that I picked it up. It is a HEAVY lens and weighs in at over 4 pounds. I won’t be taking this out on a hike very much! Another caveat is its construction so you should be mindful of its use during extreme conditions. Living in the wet confines of the Pacific Northwest, I’m very accustomed to being out in rain and snow. My camera body has weather seals but my lenses do not. I have not found this to be an issue overall but the Bigma is put together slightly different.

Six screws retain the front most element of the lens to the rest of the extending body of the lens. Given our proclivity to rain, I’m real concerned about moisture penetrating this seal. Thankfully, I have found an inexpensive solution but I’ll blog about that after I have had some time with it in actual rainy conditions. My Manfrotto ballhead can support the weight of the lens and camera but it is sensitive to vibrations. Using the camera’s timer or better yet a remote control helps mitigate for this.

The extra 200mm at the extreme end of the range does make a difference. There’s been one composition out along the Shuksan Arm that I’ve wanted to shoot but have been unable to since it won’t fill the frame at 300mm. It now does and hopefully I’ll be able to shoot it before the end of ski season next month. Focusing is fairly fast and snappy but it has hunted for focus in low light and low contrast conditions. I’ve been able to work around this by either selecting a higher contrast focus point or by pointing the lens at a higher contrast portion of the scene and then recomposing for my original scene.

The Canon / Nikon versions of this lens have a few switches near the mount which control zoom creep and manual / auto focus. The Pentax version only has the zoom lock switch and I gave myself a heart attack as I unintentionally discovered that manual / auto focus is controlled by a push/pull of the focusing ring. I thought I had broken the lens!

My last comment is about the lens hood, which requires some consideration. The horizontal petals almost half the depth of the vertical petals, presumably to avoid appearing in the frame at 50mm. My very first attempt using this lens was at a local estuary wetland during a windy rain. Although I was perpendicular to the wind, it was blowing water droplets in and onto the front of the lens. This is something I have not encountered with my Pentax DA55-300 which uses a lens hood with a uniform, deep length. This isn’t calamity by any stretch but I think folks should be aware of such things. Sometimes the photos we take can’t be duplicated so I would hate to loose a photo because I didn’t check for water droplets!

[UPDATE] I haven’t had many opportunities to use this lens until recently when I visited Boundary Bay in British Columbia to photograph the Snowy Owls. You can see those photos in my blog post here.

Snows of Deception

Feb 27

Deception Creek, that is. I didn’t have much time this weekend aside from a half afternoon. A period of lowland snow and mini-cold snap made me consider a trip to the Deception Creek trail up the Stevens Pass Highway (US-2). I’ve been here before but that was in the summertime. I thought this would be a cool place to visit on a nice snowy day so I gave it a go.

The biggest problem with going here in the winter is access. A short forest service road climbs to the trailhead but it’s not plowed in the winter. Complicating matters, there is virtually nowhere to park along this stretch of the highway during winter due to plowing activities. Add in a lot of traffic headed up to the Stevens Pass ski area and you get a nervous walk along a busy highway.

After hugging the snowbank for a third of a mile, I gladly left the highway for the forest service road. The road had a foot plus of powder so breaking trail even with cross country skis was a slow affair. Just under an hour found me in the parking lot below the eerily buzzing powerlines overhead. I decided to walk the trail instead of ski it since there’s too much tight up & down. In the forest, the snow depth eased a bit it was still calf-deep.

The trail parallels Deception Creek, never straying too far from its banks. There are several large old growth douglas fir trees and I was reminded of some of the winter scenes typical in Sequoia National Park. The trail was fairly easy to follow but I ended up losing it where the creek had previously washed over it. I was hoping to make it up to the log bridge over the creek but time was running short. I’ll have to return some other day when I can devote more time to exploring.

I almost hesitate to share these photos because, frankly, they’re rushed and a bit of a compromise due to the time constraints. Meh. Here ya go!..

Tye is High

Jan 19

…and I’m moving on. Sorry- couldn’t resist the pun.

This past weekend’s weather brought a series of strong pineapple express weather systems. For those of you not from the Pacific Northwest, a pineapple express storm is one that originates from the area around Hawaii (hence the pineapple reference) and brings a lot of moisture and high snow levels. These storms sometimes quickly follow snow storms which bring rain on snow events and that spells major flooding.

This weekend’s storm brought moderate flooding to the Skykomish River basin and I decided to head up the valley along Highway 2 to check things out. Despite the “moderate” tag, the river levels were REAL high, seemingly higher than the record events of just a couple years ago. I first tried visiting Alpine Falls along the Tye River east of the town of Skykomish but the down spray from the falls was just too great for photography.

From there, I moved on to the Deception Falls Picnic Area to check things out. Located at an elevation of about 2000 feet, it’s closed in the winter due to snow but one can usually park outside the entrance along Highway 2 and (CAREFULLY) cross the busy highway and walk in. I’ve visited on two other occasions, one of which was during a flood event back in November of 2008. By far, conditions on this day were the highest water levels I’ve seen. Quite impressive!

There are two observation platforms along the loop interpretive trail that highlight the river’s power during times like these. The first platform is located in an area where the river runs headlong into a rock wall, forcing it into a 90 degree turn. Compare yesterday’s flow versus a normal flow from two years ago:

Quite a difference! Just a little further upstream is another platform where the Tye River flows over a waterfall and bends around a corner. Now compare yesterday’s flow versus high flow back in November of 2008:

Once again, quite a difference. I made my way towards the Deception Falls along Deception Creek but the amount and force of the water was too great. The down spray was intense and the churning waters were actually splashing over the pedestrian bridge that leads you to the viewing area. My Pentax may have 77 weather seals but it can’t keep a camera safe from THAT much abuse! It was getting late in the afternoon and I wanted to make two more stops on my way back into town. I first stopped at a roadside wetland west of Skykomish. Ended up not getting very much (aside from even MORE soaked from the rain). I guess it looked cooler at 60mph!

My last stop SHOULD have been my first stop. Just west of the town of Index, there’s a spot along the Skykomish River where Kayakers park and launch into the river. In the middle of the river at this location is a huge (and I mean 2 story HUGE) boulder. On my way up earlier in the day, the river’s torrent was splashing up and OVER the top of this large boulder. I had to get a photo of this but decided to wait until my return trip.

BIG mistake.

Over the preceding four hours or so, the river level subsided enough such that the river was no longer splashing over the top. In the failing light, I was only able to snap a couple quick shots, and most weren’t up to snuff due to bad focus and some vegetation between me and the river which I could not avoid:

Moral of the story is STOP AND TAKE THE PHOTO!

Top Ten of 2010

Dec 12

My laptop is finally repaired so it’s time to look back at 2010 and pick out my ten favorite photos from the year. Ok, well, make that ten PLUS 2 because it’s always hard to limit it to just ten! I don’t know how many photos I’ve taken during the last 12 months but about 450 photos have found their way here onto my blog. From that, I chose about 100 photos to add to the galleries of my website. To me, that means it was a pretty good year!

Looking at the photos I’ve selected for this year in review, water seemed to be a popular subject of mine. The weather this summer wasn’t very good (as evidenced by the wildflower season at Mount Rainier National Park) so a number of my trips were confined to the streams and waterfalls in the forests. And so……the top ten in no particular order:

1.) “Nooksack Falls in Summer- North Fork Nooksack River Valley”

A definite favorite since I finally achieved a shot I had previously visualized. I had been looking for a different view of the falls and a higher, downward perspective seemed to fit the bill. The problem is that there isn’t a natural high viewpoint so I used a 6′ ladder to get this perspective.