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wahclella falls and elowah falls 2/9/08 Posted by pyles_94 (2008-02-11)

wahclella falls is amazing. i cant believe i had never been on this hike before. saturdays hike was amazing from start to finish. ill start at the beginning.   so when the columbia river started to be in view from 84, there was this layer of fog on the river. that was so cool, i wish i had stopped to take a picture of it! mist falls looked really cool with this thick layer of ice around the base. when we neared the mccord creek highway bridge, i got a glimpse of elowah falls. it had some ice at the bottom. that made me very exited. eventually we got to the parking lot for wahclella falls. we started the hike and i new there was munra falls right around the corner, but i had forgot to tell my neighbor about it. it was a big surprise to him. it was pretty cool. the trail climbed and there was a cool seasonal falls on the opposite wall of the canyon; and a few on the trails side of the canyon; we went on the lower trail at the split off.  right before the bridge, there was this really cool waterfall across the creek.  i had learned the rule of thirds off the internet the day before, so i thought i would try it out; i think this was the base of the waterfall in my first picture. there was a hiker coming back across the first bridge and he stopped to say hi. he was carrying a tripod. was that one of you?? this was the scene that we saw at the bridge and this is an awesome picture i got of the seasonal falls. the sun was hitting it just right; since my neighbor isnt really into photography, he went ahead and i got out my tripod and scrambled up on to the rockslide area to try to capture a picture(or maybe 50)  of wahclella falls and the side falls in one picture. i got a lot, but the lighting was all wierd (wahclella falls was dark and shaded and the side falls was bright) so i made a black and white picture. it looks dreamy; then i scrambled back down and ran to catch up with my neighbor. here are some of my wahclella falls pics: this is my favorite picture that i really like and i think it turned out awesome: and here are a couple pictures that show the wild side of wahclella falls: then as we started to climb up the trail, i realized that i forgot my walking stick at the place by the rockslide where i got out my tripod!!!! he wanted to go around the loop so i told him to walk slow and i would be right back. i ran down the trail and looked for my stick. after running back and forth a few times i found it  right where i left it.  phew!!   i sprinted  back to  the falls  and  up the trail till i  found him  pretty much right across the stream from where i was just searching for my walking stick. that was pretty dumb. the rest of the hike was pretty un eventful.   ohh, by the way, there are some branches down across the trail in two places right after munra falls, though the forest rangers will probably get them out of the way very soon.  after that we drove to john b yeon trailhead and hiked the .8 miles to elowah falls.  there was only a little bit of ice at the base, but it wasnt because of freezing conditions, it was because there was a huge ice volcano there and most of it must have collapsed. wouldnt that be an amazing site to see, the ice volcano collapsing into the splash pool and making a huge wave! ive been to elowah falls two times before this (summer and fall) and i was not expecting that much spray. my camera and i seriously got a  shower by the spray.  chameleon told me that i should look at the falls from the top of the huge boulder to the left of the falls, so i did and the spray for some reason didnt reach me up there! i took plenty of pictures of the falls, but i havent edited them yet, so there not on flickr so im not posting them yet. here is the only picture i have of elowah falls so far. its a stitched picture and i think it turned out rather nice: for some reason, there was a ton of people when i was coming back. i must have looked kinduh weird, soaked from head to toe!!  i took a total of 104 pictures on my hike and i had a great time!!!

Re: wahclella falls and elowah falls 2/9/08 Posted by pyles_94 (2008-02-11)

about halfway through my trip report i posted it because i had to eat dinner. finished now

Re: wahclella falls and elowah falls 2/9/08 Posted by joerunner (2008-02-11)

Great pictures Jamey.  Sounds like a good day.

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