Jim, Jim, Mary, and Sandy took our Samuari's out for a ride the other day. We ended up north of Mosquito Lake in the Big Valley Mountain range. The creek that drains the lake is called Tuft Creek. As we were descending into Julia Glover Flat I noticed this waterfall on Tuft Creek. It is an amazing little falls and not so small this spring. Unfortunately few have probably ever seen this falls as the creek is very seasonal and normally dry.
This is the Squaw Creek flowing into the west side of the lake about two hundred yards above the lake. The color was fantastic. Phill, Skip and I were up in the OHV area looking for photo ops.
Skip rode ten miles in and back out in the back of my Samurai with no back seat. He assured me it wasn't bad at all. It would have been were it not for the new springs and shocks.
Last Saturday Frank Kratofil and I went to Brandy Creek in the Whiskeytown National Recreation Area to photograph small things and the stream. The area where we park was not closed but there is a sign at the south end of the parking area at the entrance to the trail that say's it's closed. We decided to go in on the west side so as not to violate the sign too obviously. We did return on the trail where the sign was posted but there was no writing on the back of the sign. We took many pictures and got a few really nice ones too.
You can visit the photos at my Flickr site: http://flickr.com/photos/jarnold154/
Or my website: http://www.jimarnoldphoto.com/
After hearing about how beautiful it is there just after the rains Mary decided she would like to see it on Sunday. We arrived a little after sunrise which is ok as there is not much light in the creek area before sunrise. We parked in the same spot, took the same route (so's not to violate the sign). I got a bunch more pictures including water blur stream shots, mushrooms, and other little scenes. We spent about three hours there and were not washed away by the big avalanche upstream (because it didn't happen).
As we got back to the car, Mary discovered something on the windshield under the the wiper blade. Yep, it was a ticket. A $75 ticket at that. Not for kind of disregarding the sign but for not having a pass posted on the dashboard or anywhere else for that matter. In our big hurry to get past the sign violation glaring at us I forgot to put my $85 annual pass in the window. I told her I would fight it and at least get part of the fine dismissed, maybe.
As I was leaving I watched for a Ranger in case he/she could be talked into dismissing the whole ticket right then. I found one at the headquarters which was closed on Sunday but she was just leaving. I asked, she radioed the other Ranger who wrote the ticket, he agreed and the ticked was gone. Thank you. He also told her to admonish me for going in the closed off area. She did but it didn't seem to enthusiastic. Maybe they really don't care about that?
