standing behind Middle North Falls and looking through the curtain of water falling above
This past weekend was one of the more enjoyable in awhile and one of the highlights was a gorgeous hike we took in what I call the land of the waterfalls. Silver Falls State Park has 9 miles of trails with 10 waterfalls. We didn’t arrive early enough to hike the whole distance and didn’t know which the best falls were so took our chances and chose our trails by their length.
This post isn’t a tour of the park, but rather some of my favorite moments from what turned out to be a really happy and memorable day.
For nearly a year Rob has been suggesting this park as a destination almost every time we consider where to go for a day hike and every time I say “weeeellllll, sometime, but not today, instead let’s go to…..”. I resisted it because I had the idea that it would be a disappointing place and too crowded to enjoy. Well, I was completely wrong!
some tiny mushrooms and fern babies
Saturday was Rob’s birthday and his long time friend from college, an artist living and teaching in Chicago, came to visit for a few days. The day was mostly cloudy with a few rain showers here and there and we arrived city worn and a little hung over. As the day progressed we found ourselves feeling better and better and neither the damp weather nor the steep switchbacks thwarted our improving spirits. We happily huffed and puffed up the steep inclines to the tops of the falls breathing in the fresh cleansing air.
The water had a kind of opalescent color that seemed to light up the whole place and made it feel like magic was all around and we were a part of it. For real. And the falls were so incredible. Yes they were beautiful but the feeling of them went beyond what met the eye. I hope some of that luminescence is captured in our photos.
Upper North Falls and me at the lower right
We first walked to Upper North Falls which could only be seen at a distance and the creek flowing from it was just as lovely as the falls.
such a verdant place with all kinds of moss everywhere
Next we went to the North Falls which is very hard to show fully in photos because of the scale but I just had to try. This place had a huge and deep overhanging rock that created a very large area behind the falls. The trail goes behind the falls and underneath this huge rock and it is unlike anything I’ve ever seen nor heard. As I walked back there alone, it was deafeningly loud and I found my heart pounding in primal fear. I had to decide to breath, be in my body and to believe that the giant rock overhead wouldn’t fall and crush me like an ant!
I'm looking out from underneath that huge rock overhang here, color is true to life, no filters
This waterfall is about 170 Ft tall even though it looks small here…again, the scale is tricky here! If you look across to the other side of the falls you can see a person which helps understand how enormous this place is.
Lastly the 134 Ft Middle North Waterfall that we could also walk behind. It's much more of a lacy veil of water. Here I am standing on the trail behind the falls with the thin veil of the waterfall behind me. All of these photos were taken with an iphone and mostly without filters, isn't the color amazing?
As I looked down into the basin where the waterfall lands:
Well, if you haven't gotten your fill of water falling from this post, you may just have to get out to your local waterfall since every state seems to have at least a few or even better, take a trip to Oregon where there are hundreds!
Thanks for reading and looking, I hope this gave you some refreshment!
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