Silver Falls State Park, Oregon

We left Salem, Oregon Monday morning and drove 38 miles to Silver Falls State Park. We stopped there on our very first RV trip, in a Cruise America rental, six or seven years ago. I was not disappointed by this revisit.

It's all about the waterfalls. Ten falls, plus dozens of side trickles and gushes, all on an eight mile loop trail.

Monday afternoon we walked two and a half miles on the south end of the gorge to see the South Falls and the Lower South Falls. The trail goes under an enormous rock outcropping behind the South Falls. The thunderous power of the water is amazing.

The trail was not hard, although I was glad I had my poles along to keep me steady going over the many rocks and roots. I am so glad to be able to hike again. We missed out on so many good walks last summer as the broken bones and tendonitis in my foot healed. But I feel I need to be extra careful, and slow down when I feel any discomfort.

The river canyon was unbelievably green. Heavy moss and ferns covered the trees and ground.

Craig kept checking the fern fiddleheads, looking for a perfect one. Most were either just starting or too far unfurled. He finally found a good one!

So much to take in!  The first image above is the remains of a large tree that was burned out. I wondered, how in such a wet place there could have been a fire, but since many of the trees tower above the sides of the canyon, I guess that they must have been struck by lightning.  

On Tuesday we hiked about six miles, seeing seven more falls. We started at the North Falls parking lot and took the Winter Falls trail, that allowed us to get back to our Jeep without going all the way to the South Falls, or turning back the way we came.

Yes, it was this green! 
Many side water flows joined the river below.

Two more!

Spring has got to be the best time to visit, for the sheer volume of water pounding down over the falls.

This tree is really fighting the forces to keep standing.

This one lost. 

There were a lot of flowers along the trail, but most of them were so tiny our cameras couldn't capture them. My next camera has to have a macro feature! I've had it before and it is fun to take pictures of the tiny things. But for now, the Trilliums were big enough to photograph.

It's hard to say which falls I like the best, but since the Winter Falls had such a nice bench overlooking the pool below, it was at the top of my list. Speaking of the "top." Our hike was not quite over. We had to take a switchback trail up to the top of this canyon wall, and then walk another mile to the Jeep.

It was a long day, but will always be a treasured memory. 

I'm so glad this is a State Park and not a National Monument. It will still be here for future generations to enjoy.

A foggy Autumn drive

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Judy commented she likes her ribs naked.  Georgia would probably frown on a nudist restaurant.
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Every day the trees have been showing a little more color. Unfortunately the weather has been quite rainy and we have not gotten out as much as we would like. It has rained every night.

Monday, we decided to take a drive along the Russell-Brasstown Scenic Byway even though it was a bit wet and foggy. I would say that the color was more than halfway to its peak. Sunshine would have been nice, but the fog gave a bit of a mysterious air to the forests.

We stopped and took a two mile walk to the Dukes Creek Falls.

It was wet, but it did not rain on us.

The fog was really neat. I heard a little boy who was walking with his parents say "it's like we're in a parallel universe." A perfect description of how it felt.

Many colors.

Dukes Creek Falls is the confluence of a smaller creek, which is coming down from on high via many branches (above), with a larger creek that makes a lot of right-angle turns (below). 

We hope one of the next few days will be dry and sunny. We would like to take the same drive again because there were many turnouts that overlooked mountain vistas that were totally fogged in today.  If the weather stays as it is, the leaves will soon fall and the show will be over.

Autumn color is one reason we are here.

Amicalola Falls

♫ Amicalola, Pensacola, bibbidi-bobbidi-boo ♫

[From Craig]  Monday night we were sitting with our hosts/neighbors Karen and Al talking about things to do in Georgia.  We said we might want to go see Amicalola Falls, which someone told us was the tallest waterfall in Georgia.  Karen warned us that it involved many stairs.  That sat in our minds overnight, and Merikay and I both woke up in an adventurous mood Tuesday and decided we wanted to go there.

It was almost 50 miles from our camp south of Blairsville, and we got to the Amicalola Falls state park in the middle of the morning.  The Georgia Parks year pass that we bought a week ago got us in for free, and we stopped at the Visitor Center.  The ranger lady told Merikay that the trail along the falls included 604 stair-steps.  Karen had prepared us for this, and we decided to go for it.

They told us about the stairs, but didn't mention the rather steep 0.3 mile path leading to them.  Merikay didn't like the slope at all, and I didn't care for it much either.

We were about to return to the VC and ask for our money back, but remembered that we hadn't paid any.  Just about this time we got to the first of the stairs.

The nice part was that all the stairs were identical and all were the standard height (7 inches).  So there was nothing to do but start climbing.  We stopped at each conveniently-spaced lookout platform and went on only when we were both good and ready.

About waterfall comparisons and claims: Amicalola literature says it's the "highest waterfall east of the Mississippi".  Sites like Wikipedia and Infoplease use "highest" and "tallest" interchangeably, so we don't have to consider small waterfalls near the top of Mount Everest.  The facts about Amicalola are "729 feet in seven cascades".  That would be just high enough to make the Infoplease list, but Amicalola doesn't appear.  Probably they only count height in a single cascade...

Anyway, the cascading waterfall is off to the left as you ascend this first stair complex.  (Don't forget you can click on images to see them larger.)

At the end of the first 175 steps is a crossover bridge to the other side of the stream.  This offers the best view of the falls anywhere along the trail.

On the crossover bridge, a young lady asked if I would take a picture of her and her friend using her phone.  Of course I said yes, and then she insisted on returning the favor.  So here we are in front of the falls.

After crossing to the left side of the falls/stream, we came upon this friendly little sign.  Of course we expected it, but still...

I knew Merikay was concerned about getting up this stair, and I tried to say nothing but positive things.  Again, there were frequent rest platforms.  

The view of the falls was not as good in this upper portion as it had been in the lower.


















Finally, we made it up the last flight of stairs.  Merikay was so happy, and I was so proud of her.  604 x 7 inches = 4228 inches = 352 feet = 35 floors!

Pat on the head

This is the view looking down from the top of the falls.  It's harder to see than the views from below, but it's still a nice bunch of bouncing water!  Someone tossed a red flower on the left side.  If they wanted it to go down, they didn't succeed.

We wandered around at the top for a while.  People who don't want to climb 35 floors of stairs can drive up to the top and then walk down.  We met several such folks.

Then came the climb down.

In this direction we offered advice and encouragement to travelers in both directions.  Success was so good for our spirit!

We made it down to the bottom and fetched our lunch from the Jeep.  After lunch we revisited the Visitor Center.  Merikay almost bought this but realized that the shirt would long outlast her feeling of achievement.

I may sneak back to this VC before we leave North Georgia and buy her this owl.  Feels pretty appropriate for a retired wildlife artist...

From Merikay: I asked Craig to write the post for this hike because I was a bit tired. I feel I am getting back into shape however. About the shirt and owl, I love looking at the things in the park gift shops, but exercise restraint. Otherwise our coach would be full of stuffed toys.  "Take nothing except pictures", just like the forest. Also it helps the budget numbers.

Due to operator error, this post was published about an hour after the previous one.  So please read on below...

Day 2 Blue Ridge Parkway

On Thursday we once again went up to the Blue Ridge Parkway on Hwy 151, but this time we headed south.  

Once again we stopped at just about every overlook and were not disappointed by the views.

Although the day started quite sunny, storm clouds began building up as the day went on. When Craig was admiring the view from this vantage point, I heard the sound of water from the rock wall across the road.

I couldn't really see any water until I got much closer.

There were many tiny streams of water seeping out of the wall. This, and many similar walls were blasted out when the parkway was built.  Fascinating. 

We did take one short hike from an overlook down to a waterfall. 

We planned on eating lunch there, but as we got settled on a friendly rock, it began to rain. 

By the time we got back up to the Jeep it was pouring, so we ate there and drove on. The rain stopped, but the road and views became quite foggy.  However, we enjoyed the ride, even if we couldn't see all that we came to see. The fog was enough to make the place mystical, but not dangerous.

We have a few more days to go up there again, and probably will.