Tenas Creek

[chameleon]

Today I headed up the creek beyond 4 mile bridge, (I believe Bryan refers to this as Tenas creek?). It was a beautiful trip.

The falls a mile or so up the canyon has intrigued me for a while, and it was a lot of fun to finally check it out! However, it was hardly the highlight of the trip. About 2/3 mile in, there is a beautiful slide that begins a terrific water-feature section. I'll post more pics later, but a few to get started here.

This slide was into a beautiful bathtub like pool - probably 6 or 7 ft deep.

Just above is an 8 ft fall. Can you spot the bird's nest here?

A closer look...The birds had created a nest right in a hole behind the waterfall! You would think it would be damp, but the babies seemed to be doing just fine.

Here's what happens when mom and dad came by...

Here are mommy and daddy American Dippers coming to feed the kids.

This is the falls on the map in the upper canyon. It is roughly 45 ft, and for once is in the exact place indicated on the map.

On the way back I found this little guy.

All in all, it is a beautiful stream. As far as gorge bushwhacks go, it's not terribly difficult, but don't underestimate the distance or your energy level. It is probably a mile and a quarter off trail to the mapped falls. Nothing technical - but filled with wonderful slides and features. The forest is very scenic as well.

[raven]

Magnificent. About how far were you from the nest when you snapped those close ups of the nest and the raucous cuties?

[anna in boots]

What a treat taking a peek into the secret life of a Dipper. I love those little guys, so daring. And they've got great dance moves.

anna in boots

[chameleon]

I was probably 8 or 9 ft from them when I took those picks. They're not the best pics, but I just had to try to get a shot of the babies. I couldn't really have gotten much closer if I wanted to (probably something mommy and daddy dipper considered when they chose their nest) - as it really was right in the wall next to the falls, and the pool at the bottom might be waist deep. It definately was fun to see this little family and what terrific parents these birds are. They were catching all kinds of bugs for their youngins. Another interesting thing is that they would dip the bugs in water before feeding them. Maybe to give the babies more moisture? Or perhaps it's just force of habit...they are "dippers" after all!
-Zach

[chameleon]

Here are a couple more pics...

[Sore Feet]

Man, every tributary that you probe up Eagle Creek trends in a exponentially more scenic path. Really gonna have to log some serious time in there. FYI - I didn't name the creek, the falls are called Tenas Falls because that's how Greg Plumb referred to them in his book. If you have an idea for a name for the stream, I'm all for it.

[airdrum]

Hey Zach great work! I went up Tenas Creek a couple of years ago and found those lovely slides, what a great area! My goal was also to reach the marked falls but I came up short, it was the trip that convinced me to buy a GPS as I was just thinking to myself going up the stream "It's just a mile and a half at the most" but I drastically overestimated the distance I had traveled and turned around, thinking I had found nothing, before I reached the falls. There was also a lack of energy component!

Thanks for revealing what is finally up there, I remeber thinking based on all the elevation the creek loses without any large, 50'+ waterfalls that maybe this could be the one lame ducj stream in the gorge without a major falls, and instead traded them out for a bunch of scenic slides, I was wrong!

I'm going to go back through my pictures of that trip and if I have anything worthy to post I will!

[chameleon]

Bryan and Andy,
Yeah, it is a very photogenic stream. The terrain is gentle and the forest is lush. The trees are almost all small though, probably indicating an intense fire must have hit it at some point in the past century. It's a quiet, tranquil place. Atop that slide at 2/3 mile is a relatively flat bed of moss that almost begged an afternoon nap. While many other streams, such as Fern creek and Four mile are fairly rugged, this creek is liesurely and rich. Most of the wildlife I observed were birds, but I did see 5 pacific giants in the stream, lots of birds, and the tracks of what I believe was a mountain beaver in soft mud by a log. There were also places of broken, trampled foliage along the stream, probably from deer and bears, but no sight of them. Definately a pleasant place to visit.
-Zach
Look forward to seeing those pics if you find them Andy! I hope you get in there to see the one real falls at some point. I suppose you could consider it a 4-plunged falls, as there are 3 nice slides leading up to it, but the only real section I considered a true falls is that top 45-50ft. (As you can see though...the slides were lots more photogenic!)

[chameleon]

here are two more pics - in the first you can see the nice flat mossy spot on top of this slide

[airdrum]

Well I only have one that is A- not ruined by sunlight and B-has something in common with your pics! Here is detail of the bottom of the nice slide that starts the feature section, this is ironically where I stopped thinking "so this is a marked falls!?"

Seems the water was higher for me, as it was flowing towards the side more, interesting to see how things can change in a couple years and in different seasons.