About noonish I left the trailhead with light snow falling. I got to the upper falls probably @ 1pm and spent the next three hours taking pictures, breaking some dead branches up for a small campfire, etc... I debated camping on the ledge behind the falls, but decided not to, given the crumbly rocks above and the fact that with the freezing temps, I would not want to wake up to a huge rock pinning me to the ledge. (the ledge below the middle falls would be much safer for camping) Water expanding the cracks as it froze could cause some nasty rocks to come down.
As darkness fell, I built a campfire, made dinner on my stove, and listened to "The Old Man and the Sea" (narrated by Donald Sutherland - unabridged - awesome) on my mp3 player. The night was spooky though. I don't typically feel this way about natural places, and perhaps it was my imagination due to all the bones, etc... in the area... but for about 1/2 hour during the night there just seemed to be a "bad energy" feel in the area, for lack of a better term. No snapping twigs, piles of stone, or other Blair witchiness, but a palbable feel that sent my imagination racing. Earlier that evening as I was sitting in the dark around my small campfire I was poking around in the snow to find some more sticks and threw what I thought was one onto the fire, only to see that it was a bone! A closer inspection led me to one of the numerous deer skulls nearby.
Every once in a while I would shine my flashlight at the top of the amphitheater above the falls, hoping the see the eyes of a cougar or bobcat. On one occasion, a bright spot of light caught my eye and my heart raced! I turned my flashlight off to see if it went away with no light reflecting, but oddly enough...it didn't!? I moved to a better angle and realized that it was a star - shining through the trees, right on the top edge of the amphitheater! The sky had cleared a bit.
And it got cold...probably about 0 or a bit above. The snow had stopped early, and the sky opened up and was clear. At about 2 am it was almost bright out. I kept waking up thinking morning had come, only to realize that the night was just really bright.
Finally the morning did come and it was a beautiful day. I found a much better way to get up above the top falls, but decided not to follow the stream up further, banking on using my time to get some photos of the 3 main falls with snow that day. It was fun. Here are a few photos of the trip:
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- which by the way is a pretty cold place to be given the inversion factor (warm air rising). It was worth it. I plan on doing it again this Sunday/Monday but haven't picked out where yet...have to decide tomorrow. I've driven up to the Gorge a couple mornings before going to work this week, but haven't been too impressed with the snow since last Monday...hopefully we'll get a bit more before the "system" peters out. Have you gotten any good icy shots this week?