Adventures of a swimming hole aficionado

Below is an index of my swimming hole and waterfall trip reports. I have listed them by state.

( Click here to view the list )

Today, I checked out the waterfalls on the Tuckasegee River in Panthertown Valley in the Nantahala National Forest. This area had been on my back burner since the third edition of Kevin Adams’ North Carolina Waterfalls book came out in 2016. The state is currently experiencing an uncharacteristically long stretch of dry weather, and the rivers in the southwestern part of the state are very low, which opens up some of the larger ones for swimming. I had wanted to take advantage of this by checking out some new spots on the Horsepasture River, but they were too secluded to check out safely, and I couldn’t rope anyone into going with me. I thought about revisiting the touristy parts of the river, but I felt like I should check out something new, so Panthertown it was.

Panthertown Valley has over ten waterfalls, so today I planned to hike downstream along the Tuckasegee River and check out Warden, Jawbone, Riding Ford, Elbow, and Red Butt Falls. A sixth waterfall, Lichen Falls, spills into the river from a small tributary stream about half a mile downstream of Red Butt Falls and is only accessible by creek-walking or bushwhacking. Jawbone Falls was the only one on today’s agenda with a guaranteed swimming hole, but Elbow Falls looked like it might also have a small one. Panthertown’s most popular waterfall, Schoolhouse Falls on Greenland Creek, was only a quarter-mile detour from my route, so I planned to check it out as well, as it was unclear from pictures if the pool at its base was deep enough to be a swimming hole.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, I wasn’t really blown away by any of the waterfalls or swimming holes today. I thought they were all kind of mid, as the kids say, but if I had to pick a favorite, it would probably be Warden Falls, which I would not have expected. It was the second best waterfall and the overall nicest spot, since it had a legit swimming hole. The best waterfall per se was probably Jawbone Falls, but its swimming hole was disappointing due to the underwater clutter and lack of flat rocks for lounging. The middle portion of Red Butt Falls passes with a C- for a legit water slide. It wasn’t very fast or steep, but it offered a good 10-15 feet of smooth sliding. I’m not sure I would make a special trip to check out the rest of the Panthertown waterfalls, but I might consider returning to tie up loose ends if I happen to be in the area and need a filler excursion. It might have to be on a day with subpar weather, though, because I kind of regretted passing up a sunny, low-flow day at the Horsepasture River for this.

Today, Brian and I walked upper Wilson Creek between FR 192 and Edgemont Road. We had previously hiked the Wilson Creek Trail in 2018, and creek-walked the section of Wilson Creek between the trail and FR 192 in 2019. During the latter excursion, we had briefly looked at the creek just downstream of the Edgemont Road bridge and saw that it had some small sliding cascades and was hemmed by cliffs as it quickly dropped out of sight. We had always been curious to return and walk the creek between FR 192 and Edgemont Road to see if there was anything interesting there, but five years went by and we never got around to it. On our previous excursions, we had checked out 13 out of 15 points of interest (POIs) I marked on Google Earth as potential swimming holes. POIs 14 and 15 are upstream of FR 192, and there is no good satellite imagery upstream of POI 15, so the upstream half of that section has always been a mystery. I wasn’t expecting to find any significant swimming holes there, but I thought there could be some nice cascades since the creek loses over 600 feet of elevation between the two roads.

I’ve noticed that the first weekend in June is almost always dry, which held true this year, although it wasn’t particularly warm in the mountains (today's forecast called for mid 60s). Since the weather wasn’t ideal for swimming, I decided now was the time to check out upper Wilson, since I wasn’t expecting to find any significant swimming holes.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, this section of Wilson Creek didn't have anything remarkable, but there was one legit swimming hole, and a 25-30 foot waterfall about 100 feet back on a small side-stream. Other than that, the creek was basically a series of small sliding cascades and shallow pools, similar to Little Wilson Creek upstream of Edgemont Road. It did seem like the slides were starting to get bigger toward the upstream end of the walk, so it’s possible there might be higher cascades upstream, between Edgemont Road and the Blue Ridge Parkway. However, I probably wouldn’t check that out unless I really needed something to do.

Today, I finally got to tackle the waterfalls of Flat Laurel Creek, which has been up there on my wish list since the third edition of Kevin Adams’ North Carolina Waterfalls book came out in 2016. This is a stretch of creek that loses about 800 feet of elevation in a series of cascades and waterfalls over three quarters of a mile. I wasn’t sure if there would be any swimming holes, but it seemed like the creek walk would be worthwhile regardless. Also, there are a couple of roadside attractions in the immediate vicinity (Bubbling Spring Branch Cascades, Sunburst Falls on the West Fork Pigeon River), and I knew that the former had a swimming hole. I was curious to see if Sunburst Falls did as well.

The main obstacle for the Flat Laurel Creek walk is that it’s a thru-hike where you leave a vehicle at each end of the trailhead (otherwise you have to backtrack through the creek down hundreds of feet of cascades), so I needed a second person who was both willing and able to do this type of hike. My friend, Chris (who did Cave Falls with me last summer) was up for it, so we planned to do it today since the forecast was cloudless and bone-dry.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, Flat Laurel Creek lived up to my expectations and was worth the wait. It was definitely one of the best creek walks I’ve been on in terms of effort vs reward. It was a workout, but it wasn’t super strenuous or technical (for experienced off-trail hikers). Chris got through the whole thing without getting his feet wet (except for intentionally soaking them in the main swimming hole, with his shoes off). Once the cascades get going, they are pretty much non-stop all the way to the top. I wasn’t sure if there would be any legit swimming holes, but there was one at the base of cascade 7(ish). There were also a couple of smaller pools that looked like they might be legit. The creek walk would still have been worth the price of admission even if the main swimming hole hadn’t been there, but it really rounded things out. That particular spot was probably the highlight of what we saw today.

As for the roadside attractions, Bubbling Spring Branch Falls failed to impress after Flat Laurel Creek. The supposed swimming hole at the top looked kind of dinky, so unless there was something upstream that I missed, then I would say it’s probably not worthy of a return visit unless I happen to be passing by for some other reason. Sunburst Falls, on the other hand, looked like a legit swimming hole, so now I’m interested to find out if it’s a one-hit-wonder or just a sneak peak at what else the West Fork Pigeon River has to offer.

Today, I finally got to go to Cave Falls in Linville Gorge, which has been on my to-do list for a while. I had tried to get to it alone last month by swimming through the Bob Ross Gorge and climbing up the rocks next to a rapid/small waterfall the boaters call Seal Launch Portage (aka A Good Way to Die), but I decided it was too sketchy to do alone (as with my previous entries, all rapid names are per American Whitewater and A Wet State). I’ve been trying to find people online who are into this sort of thing, and I networked with this guy Chris from Asheville who said he liked intense hikes and might be up for it, so we planned to meet up and tackle it today. Unlike my previous trips to this section of the gorge where I had used the moderate Spence Ridge Trail, today we would be using the more strenuous but more direct Devil’s Hole Trail, which loses about 1000 feet of elevation in a about a mile and meets the river about a quarter mile upstream of Cave Falls.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, Cave Falls is a pretty cool spot. It has a large swimming hole with a low jump of about six feet, and it’s surrounded by some pretty impressive geology. From what I’ve seen so far, I would say the best swimming hole in the gorge is easily Cathedral, both in terms of swimming hole functionality and geological grandeur, but Cave Falls is a contender for runner-up, along with the Bob Ross Gorge and Babel Tower Falls (the latter actually isn’t one of my top picks, but it’s a fan favorite, so I felt obligated to throw it in there). I was hoping to tie up a few loose ends from my winter scouting trip (e.g., Jailhouse) today, but we were unable to do so since the rain cut things short. After experiencing the Devil’s Hole Trail for the first time, I can say one thing for sure: I did NOT skip leg day.

For the last day of my Asheville/Boone trip, I decided to explore the lower section of Upper Creek. I had previously hiked the trail that follows this section of the creek in 2016, when I conquered Raven Cliff Gorge with Mary and Orin. We had seen that there were some possible cascades and swimming holes on our way up the trail, but we neglected to check them out since they were not on the agenda for that excursion. Returning to check out this section of the creek was never high on my agenda, but I chose to do it today because I had to drive back to Raleigh afterwards, and I wanted to do something that I thought would be relatively quick and easy. This particular trailhead was only a couple of miles off the paved road, and it was farther south (i.e., closer to I-40) than most of the other swimming hole attractions in the Wilson Creek area, so I would have more of a head-start for the drive back. I had scanned the creek on Google Earth and marked six points of interest (POIs), and my plan was to hike all the way to POI 6, which was the farthest upstream at about 1.5 miles from the trailhead, and then work my way back downstream. This would allow me to scope out all the side-trails down to the creek on the way in so I would know all my options for accessing my POIs on the way back.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, the lower section of Upper Creek does have some cascades and swimming holes, but nothing that really holds a candle to Upper Creek Falls or Raven Cliff Gorge. The best cascade was probably the lower one at POI 2, which was about 7-8 feet high. POI 1 ended up being the highlight of the places I checked out today, boasting two cascades and two legit swimming holes. I wouldn’t say it's worth making a special trip, but it would make for a nice short hike and swim if you happen to be camping at one of the sites along FR 197. With today’s trek, I am one step closer to exploring all of Upper Creek between FR 197 and Upper Creek Falls. The only section I have left to explore is between Upper Creek Falls and the Mountains-to-Sea Trail, which will be one hell of a creek walk.

Today, I did a creek walk on Avents Creek in Raven Rock State Park. I had wanted to go to the mountains this coming week because there is going to be a three-day streak of warm weather with less than a 10% chance of rain Monday-Wednesday, which is pretty rare for late September. Unfortunately, I have a meeting at work on Wednesday, which means I would have to drive back to Raleigh on Tuesday, which means I would only really get to do anything on Monday. I decided that one day of swimming hole action wasn’t worth taking two days of leave, paying for two nights in a hotel, and finding a pet-sitter. Still, I wanted to at least do something creeky this weekend, so Avents Creek was my tenuous consolation prize.

A few years ago, I had checked out the rapids Lanier Falls and Fish Traps on the Cape Fear River, as well as Campbell Creek and Little Creek on the south side of the river. The only legit swimming hole I have found in the park thus far is Lanier Falls, which Kevin Adams actually lists in the third edition of his North Carolina Waterfalls book (I guess he has low standards for piedmont waterfalls, if you can call them that, since they are so rare). He also lists a small four-foot waterfall called Jumping Fish Falls on Avents Creek, which is on the north side of the river. I checked out Jumping Fish Falls on an un-blogged trip back in 2017 and found it underwhelming, but I did note that Avents Creek seemed to have some broad pools near the falls that may have been deep enough to be swimming holes. I didn’t explore Avents Creek on that visit because my main objective was to go swimming at Lanier Falls, but I did file it away as something to check out if I got really bored. My plan for today was to take the West Loop Bridal Trail to the point where it crosses the creek at Jumping Fish Falls and follow the creek about half a mile downstream to the confluence with the Cape Fear River before heading back upstream to where it flows under the road (which is about a mile upstream of the river).

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, I didn’t find anything noteworthy on Avents Creek, although I wasn’t really expecting to. There were a couple of spots that may have been waist to shoulder deep, but no legit swimming holes. The only significant cascade I found that I had not seen before was the small slide upstream of Jumping Fish Falls, but it wasn't anymore interesting than Jumping Fish Falls or the small cascade at the road bridge. Avents Creek did make for a chill late-afternoon creek walk, which is really all I was hoping for. Of the three creeks I have checked out in Raven Rock (Avents, Campbell, and Little Creek), I would say Campbell Creek is probably the most interesting, which isn’t saying much, but it does at least have a few rock bluffs above it, unlike Avents Creek. I think Fish Creek is the only named creek in the park I haven’t checked out at this point.

Today, I kayaked up Lake Jocassee to explore some more swimming holes on the Thompson River. I was sort of intent on reaching a swimming hole by unconventional means, and my first idea was to bike (well, partway) to Wintergreen Falls on the Toxaway River, but renting a bike seemed like too much trouble, so I decided kayaking might be fun. Plus, my lower body got a workout yesterday, so I figured I would give my upper body a workout today. Yesterday’s hike at the upper Thompson River had nice waterfalls and a couple of swimming holes, but none that were really primo (plus the air and water were both too chilly for a swim to be pleasant). I was hoping the lower section of the river might be an improvement on both counts, since it looks less shaded on Google Earth and is at a lower elevation. I had noted a couple of significant-looking sliding waterfalls with pools on Google Earth, and it looked like the river had continuous cascades and pools from the lower slide down to where the river flows into the lake. When researching Lake Jocassee, I had also come across Wrights Creek Falls, one of several waterfalls that spill directly into the lake (that was actually how I got the idea to go kayaking in the first place; I didn’t actually decide to do the lower Thompson River until after finding out it fed into the lake near Wrights Creek Falls).

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, I found the lower stretch of the Thompson River to be a little more swimming-hole-licious than Big Falls and the other upstream waterfalls. There were at least three legit swimming holes and one potentially slide-able sliding waterfall. I would say the best swimming hole would be the big one with the log over the cascade that spills into it. I didn’t check the depth there, but it was the largest swimming hole and seemed to have the most potential for vertical tomfoolery. The water was also slightly warmer less frigid here than the upper section, although if you want warmer water, then you might as well just swim and cliff jump in Lake Jocassee, which was about 12 degrees warmer than the Thompson River today. That said, this lake is on my “would come back to” list. The weather was still a little cool for a swim to be totally refreshing, but the lake would be great on a hot sunny day. It has clear blue water and a lot of nice coves to explore. I probably wouldn’t rent a kayak and try to redo an excursion like the one I did today. Having to return the boat at a certain time made things too rushed, and I didn’t have much time to just relax and enjoy being out on the water. It would have been nice to have an extra hour or so. My upper body is sore and stiff from aggressive paddling, my legs and shoulders are sunburnt, and the paddle blisters on my hands are epic. I’m looking forward to a hot bath in the jaccuzi tub and some aloe vera when I get to my parents’ house in Virginia tomorrow. I am now ready to collapse from exhaustion.

Last year, my brother Brian and I hiked the Wilson Creek Trail along an upper section of Wilson Creek upstream from the more popular Wilson Creek Gorge. Before that hike, I had scanned the creek on Google Earth and marked 13 points of interest (POIs) that looked like potential swimming holes. We got to the first ten POIs on the previous hike, but the trail left the creek and headed back up to the road between POIs 10 and 11, meaning that POIs 11-13 would require a creek walk. It was already late by the time we had reached this point in the trail, so we decided we didn’t have time for POIs 11-13 on that trip. There were several weekends with nice weather this summer that I wanted to try and wrap this up, but Brian usually had other plans.

After swimming-holing the hell out of August with back-to-back trips to Tennessee and California, I was really looking forward to just chillaxing at home and doing absolutely nothing this weekend. I haven’t had a full day of downtime since the beginning of August, and I’ve been exhausted all of this past week, probably due to jet lag from returning from California. However, the weather in the North Carolina mountains was supposed to be warm and sunny all weekend, followed by an extended period of rain, so I figured I could squeeze in one last weekend of swimming hole action before fall arrives and I go into hibernation. Brian was free this weekend, so we decided to knock out the rest of the Wilson Creek Trail today.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, this excursion did nothing to change my mind that the highlights of the Wilson Creek Trail are on the downstream end, even though the new stuff we saw today technically wasn’t along the trail. We didn’t find any legit swimming holes that we had not already seen on last year’s hike, but it was a decent and fairly easy creek walk, and it was nice to satisfy my lingering curiosities from last year. We might make it a point to creek-walk the upper section of Wilson Creek between the Forest Road and Edgemont Road, but that will probably be more for a time when I just want to do something outdoorsy and am not itching to go swimming, as I would not expect to find any legit swimming holes there.

For Day 4 of this year’s California swimming hole marathon, Cade and I went to Rock Creek, a tributary of the North Fork Feather River outside of Oroville, CA. This was sort of part 2 of my “what if?” curiosities from Day 5 of our 2017 trip. On that day, we intended to go to Seven Falls but couldn’t because the road was closed, so I had to choose between Curtain Falls and Rock Creek as a backup plan. I went with Curtain Falls and couldn't decide afterwards if the swimming hole was really worth the effort, so I have always wondered if Rock Creek would have been a better choice. Rock Creek has numerous swimming holes. Timothy Joyce’s Swimming Holes of California book lists a lower, middle, and upper Rock Creek. Middle Rock Creek seems to be the most popular from what I have seen, as it boasts a large, deep pool of crystal clear water and a natural water slide. It looked like there was going to be too much at Rock Creek to see in one day, so we opted to start off at Middle Rock Creek and play it by ear from there. Upper Rock Creek sounded like it would be quite a challenge to get to, so while it didn’t look like it would be a highlight swimming hole, I sort of wanted to get to it just for street cred.

After eating breakfast and stopping by Wal-Mart in Chico to get a replacement pair of sunglasses to preemptively replace my current pair that is on the verge of breaking, we drove about an hour to Rock Creek. We drove through an area damaged by the Camp Fire last year, and it looked pretty devastating. There were a lot of homes that were destroyed to the foundation (I noticed one where only the chimney remained), and it looked like people in the area were mostly living in motorhomes. The damage ended only a few miles away from the confluence of Rock Creek with the North Fork Feather River.

The canyon that the North Fork Feather River flows through was pretty spectacular and almost rivaled the scale and ruggedness of Kings Canyon, which we drove through last year (I didn't blog that day since we didn't go swimming). There were areas where the road was at least 1000 feet above the canyon floor. We had to drive through several tunnels as we neared Rock Creek. When we pulled in, we went under a train trestle and passed up the trail for lower Rock Creek, which was close to the entrance. We took the gravel road up the hill for a couple of switchbacks until we found a small parking area with enough room for about four cars. There were already two vehicles there. One was for some school, and the other was for some sort of adventure/discovery group. Before we got started, I decided to only take a small gym bag, as my regular backpack would be a huge pain for the amount of boulder scrambling and ledge scaling that probably lay ahead.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, I rather enjoyed Rock Creek, even though boulder scrambling normally gets on my nerves. Most of the strenuous and technical stuff we did today was optional. The granite rocks here were textured enough that they were pretty easy to maneuver around on, and there was a good mix of small and large rocks that created incremental steps to various height gaps when we needed to get up or down. I joked that the two most important exercises one should do to prepare for Rock Creek are dips and lunges, as I definitely used my arms just as much as I used my legs to get around today. I did do a couple of things today that were probably sketchier than I should have done in such a secluded, rugged area, but the only casualty was my swimsuit. It’s kind of sad that it won’t be making it home from this trip after all of the swimming holes it has been to with me. I now only have one swimsuit left in my suitcase for this trip, and it has no liner. We are planning to do another boulder scramble at Candy Rock the day after tomorrow, and I’m thinking I might have to do that one in my underwear, since my second swimsuit doesn’t have a liner.

Anyway, back to the swimming hole situation at Rock Creek. The swimming holes here were gorgeous and crystal clear, ranging from emerald green to sapphire blue. The water temperature was cool, but not so cold that it took the fun out of swimming (at least not for me). It was kind of a bummer that the slide had a downed tree across it, though. I would say Middle Rock Creek is the highlight swimming hole. Upper Rock Creek was nice, but I would really only recommend it if you just want to do it for the adventure and satisfaction of conquering it, as the swimming hole per se isn’t necessarily any better than Middle Rock Creek. Getting there was basically a half-mile jungle-jim of boulders and logs. We didn’t get to see anything below Middle Rock Creek today (other than some obscured views from the cliffs above), so I would like to come back in the future and explore Lower Rock creek.

So, did I make the right choice two years ago when I chose Curtain Falls over Rock Creek? I would say yes, because I eventually got to do both, and I wouldn’t have actually known that Curtain Falls was more trouble than it was worth without having gone there. Curtain Falls looks more impressive in pictures, so I probably would have lived with a bigger ghost if I had passed that one up.

Today I got to finally (partially) knock off something that has been on my to-do list for the past two or three years. After checking out Gragg Prong and Steels Creek in 2015, I got into the habit of scanning creeks and rivers on Google Earth and marking points of interest (POIs) that looked like potential swimming holes or waterfalls. It started with scanning larger creeks with known swimming holes, like Upper Creek and Harper Creek, but I admittedly got a little carried away with it and even started scanning smaller tributaries. I would first check topo maps for areas where creeks dropped significantly over short distances, and then I would scan those drop zones on Google Earth to see if I could see any whitewater. There was one creek in particular that caught my attention, which I will call “Cinnamon Creek” to keep the location a secret (I know this spot is probably too esoteric for most people, but I don’t want to be the first to give up the location on a place that has avoided the internet thus far). Cinnamon Creek drops about 200 feet over less than a quarter mile, and a scan of Google Earth showed a few obvious cascades and one possible swimming hole. These features didn’t look that significant, but I’ve been to quite a few good swimming holes that look like nothing on Google Earth, so I was curious to get down there and check the area out for myself. I had marked three points of interest (POIs) numbered in order from upstream to downstream. POIs 1 and 3 were possible waterfalls at what appeared to be the beginning and end of the drop zone, and POI 2 was a potential swimming hole. The stretch of creek between POIs 2 and 3 was largely hidden by shadows and canopy on Google Earth, so I refer to this area as the “shadow zone”. I had no idea what could be hiding in the shadow zone. I've scoured the internet looking for information on this creek, but I could find literally nothing about it other than the occasional hiking blogger mentioning that they crossed it while hiking on the Mountains-to-Sea trail. Even waterfall guru Kevin Adams makes no mention of it in the latest edition of his North Carolina Waterfalls book, and he lists some pretty obscure spots. It was pretty clear that if I really wanted to know what was there, I was going to have to explore it myself.

I kept this excursion on the back-burner for 2016, as I still hadn’t finished checking out all the highlights of the Wilson Creek area at that time. I was hoping to get to it in 2017, but several different stars needed to align for this excursion to happen: I needed 1) a bone-dry day, 2) on a summer weekend, and 3) when a buddy was a available who wouldn’t beat my ass for dragging them on a “creekwhack” (creek walk + bushwhack) that potentially offered no reward. There was one day that met all those criteria during the first weekend of June last year. I foolishly passed it up thinking there would be another opportunity that summer, but there wasn’t. The only person I know within driving distance who would be down for this type of trek is my brother, Brian, who is a pretty hardcore hiker and backpacker (his credentials include hiking the entire Appalachian and Pacific Crest Trails, among others). Our schedules don’t match up most of the time, but he was off this weekend and up for an excursion. As of two days ago, the forecast called for both Saturday and Sunday to be dry, so I planned to do back-to-back swimming hole excursions in the Wilson Creek Area this weekend. Tomorrow (Sunday) has been changed to a 60 percent chance of rain, but today was still supposed to be dry, so I decided today would be the best day to do Cinnamon Creek.

Another place I have been wanting to check out is Zigzag Falls on an unnamed tributary of Steels Creek. It didn’t seem worthy of a special trip, but it is close to the road, so I figured it would make a good tacked-on ending to another excursion. I got close to it in 2016 after I went to Wilson Creek Gorge with my friend Miranda, but she didn’t have any desire to bushwhack to it (or to wait on me to bushwhack to it), so that has been somewhat of a loose end for the past couple of years. Kevin Adams mentions in his book that the upper portion of the waterfall has a pool in it, and Google Earth seems to confirm this, so I was interested to see if the pool could be a swimming hole.

I spent the night in Greensboro last night and drove up to Pineola this morning. Brian met me at the Pineola Inn where I am staying, which is super convenient to most of the swimming holes in the Wilson Creek and Linville Gorge areas. I ate a Jersey Mike’s sub that I had picked up on the way over, and then we headed out to Cinnamon Creek.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In summary, we saw some pretty cool stuff today. I would have thought Cinnamon Creek was kind of "meh" had it been along an established hiking trail with other people around, but the secret hideout feel and the fact that there was literally no trace of anyone ever having been there made it a fun adventure. We didn't find anything major, but I do enjoy a good creek walk, and it’s nice when there are at least some cascades or swimming holes to make things interesting. I would say it was nice to have finally satisfied my curiosity for Cinnamon Creek, since I explored the area I was most curious about and actually found a pool that I would say could pass for a legit swimming hole (although it was not the pool I had initially thought would be the swimming hole). However, it feels incomplete since I didn’t make it all the way to the bottom of the waterfall area. We probably could have done it if we had gotten started an hour or two earlier. Not getting to the bottom is going to be a loose end for me. It seemed so attainable, but better safe than sorry, I guess. Each time we descended a cascade, we were potentially getting ourselves into deeper and deeper shit from a getting-help/rescue standpoint should something go wrong, and the thought of that became too much after we were four cascades deep with only a couple of hours of daylight left. I am curious to see the rest of the waterfall area, but I would want a group of at least four people next time, and I’m not sure I could round up enough people who are both willing and able to complete this trek (I would probably lose even the most adventurous people I know at the part that requires swimming through a deep pool of 60 degree water). Perhaps Team Waterfall will see this and pick up where I left off. I might be content seeing pictures of what I missed, but the completionist in me wants to get back out there and finish what I started. As far as Zigzag Falls, I would say curiosity satisfied. The potential swimming hole didn’t end up being anything terribly interesting, and the waterfall was cool from what we saw, but I don’t feel the need to get more vantage points of it.
___

Update: We returned to Cinnamon Creek in 2020 and checked out the remaining points of interest. Click here for Part 2 of our Cinnamon Creek explorations.

Today, Cade and I went to Curtain Falls on the Middle Fork Feather River at Bald Rock Dome near Oroville, CA. We had initially planned to visit nearby Seven Falls, but Cade was leery of driving his car on any more dirt roads after Monday’s misadventure, so we were trying to see if we could find any indication online of the road conditions. In doing so, we found that the road was closed for repairs, so I suggested we do Curtain Falls instead, as I wanted to hit at least one swimming hole in the Feather River system (tangent: the pun-master in me finds it amusing that the Feather River is part of the Plumas National Forest). Bald Rock Dome also requires some gravel road driving, but the trailhead is a little more “official”, so we thought the road would probably be reasonably maintained. I actually recommended this place for Bald Rock Dome more than Curtain Falls per se. By this point in the trip, we were almost certainly not going to make it to Yosemite, so I thought Bald Rock Dome might round things out by providing a little Yosemite-esque scenery.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos. )

In summary, I was kind of underwhelmed by Curtain Falls and Bald Rock Canyon. They were sort of like a less interesting version of Tallulah Gorge in Georgia (albeit twice as deep and with prettier water). The swimming hole itself was okay, but getting there (or getting back, rather) was kind of annoying and more trouble than it was worth, in my opinion. Granted, a lot of swimming holes can be annoying to get to, but in many cases, the payoff is worth the effort, and having to boulder-scramble and swim to get there just adds to the adventure. I thought Curtain Falls was right at “worth it” status while I was actually at the swimming hole, but the return hike left a bad taste in my mouth (or maybe that was all the flies I ate). It might have been more rewarding if the flow were low enough to allow for jumping and safe sliding, but that was not the case today. I thought this place would be pretty cool based on the pictures I had seen (in fact, I'm looking back through my own pictures and wondering how I was not impressed), as it has been my experience that many things look bigger and more impressive in person than in photos. However, Curtain Falls and Bald Rock Canyon are more of a “what you see is what you get” type of deal; I didn't experience more of a "wow factor" from seeing it in person than I did from seeing it in pictures. I might have been more impressed if this had been the first place we hit, but the North Fork American and the South Yuba Rivers are hard acts to follow. If I lived within driving distance, then I would probably give Curtain Falls another chance at lower flow, but it would not be high on my to-do list if I were only in California for a few days.

Today, I returned to one of my (formerly?) all-time favorite swimming hole spots: Devil’s Fork near Fort Blackmore, Virginia. Devil’s Fork is a small crystal clear creek that runs along a trail that used to be an old mining railroad. The understory of the forest is covered in ferns and moss. Its main attraction is the Devil’s Bathtub, which is an oval pothole about ten feet deep that has been carved into the rocks, and it is shaped exactly like a bathtub. Just downstream is a larger swimming hole, also about ten feet deep. About a half mile upstream of the bathtub is a 15-20 foot waterfall that spills into Devils Fork from a side tributary (most people don’t see this, or at least they didn’t used to, as they turn back after reaching the bathtub). I had first discovered this area ten years ago in 2006 when I was trying to expand my swimming hole repertoire. At that time, this place was pretty obscure. There were no pictures of it on the internet, and the few sources that did mention it had really vague directions. I didn’t even find it on my first attempt. I first came out here with Miranda (on July 17, 2006, according to the time stamps on the digital photos), and as I recall, we drove all over the place before we even found the parking area, and even then, we couldn’t find the trail because there were several creeks converging on the vicinity, and we couldn’t figure out which one we were supposed to follow, so we gave up for the day. I came back with my brother the next day (I think), and we took an old logging road that we thought was the correct trail to the top of the mountain, and we came out in an area in the middle of the woods with a bunch of abandoned campers and trailers (it looked like something straight out of a Wrong Turn movie). We went back down to the trailhead, and we found a faint path through the weeds that connected to an obvious trail along another creek, and this ended up being the correct trail. When I saw the swimming holes, I immediately fell in love with them for how gorgeous and secluded they were. I came back here with friends numerous times from 2006-2009, and we usually didn’t see anyone else there. We rarely saw one or two other people.

( In 2012, I hiked the entire Devil's Fork Loop Trail. Click here for a summary of that miserable experience. )

Before today, the last time I went to Devils Bathtub was in 2013 with my friends Mary and Jordan. I can’t remember if this was on a weekend, but there had been about ten other people there, which was not excessive, but kind of unprecedented. Since then, word has apparently gotten out over social media, and the area has become mainstream. There was a news report from last year about the parking area filling up and people parking their cars illegally on private property. Mary had tried to go here in either 2014 or 2015, and there had been a large crowd, so she left in disgust. I had sort of written this place off as a loss after hearing about this, because it is not the type of swimming hole that can accommodate crowds, and part of its charm was that it was so secluded and obscure. Now there are signs everywhere making it easy to find. As bummed as I was to hear what has become of Devil’s Bathtub, I had been watching some youtube videos of people swimming around and going underwater in the pools, which made me want to go back. I had planned on going home to my parents’ house in Virginia this weekend, and I wanted to do two swimming hole treks (Steels Creek being one of them), so I figured a return to Devil’s Fork could be my second. My knees still have not quite forgiven me since Three Forks last month, but I figured they could take two more days of punishment this summer since they are about to have the entire winter to recover. I really need to invest in some trekking poles for next year, though.

( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

In conclusion, I would say the crowds at Devil’s Bathtub take this place down a few notches. I overheard some people saying that they had driven over three hours to get here. Having to wait my turn to get into Devil’s Bathtub is some bullshit. Standing in line is for water parks, and that’s half the reason I prefer natural swimming holes. This used to be my second favorite swimming hole spot after Upper Creek Falls, but now I’m not even sure if it’s Top 5 material. Fortunately the aesthetics of the area haven’t really suffered yet (aside from the people themselves being eye sores); there was a plastic bottle and a beer can here and there, but the place wasn’t covered in trash like I expected it would be. Someone must have come through and cleaned it recently. One upside to the increased visitation is that the trail is in much better shape, especially beyond the bathtub, although I would personally rather have a rough trail and no crowds. Even though the creeks here aren't very big, I sort of want to explore some of the other creeks not accessible by trail, because it's really hard to find crystal clear streams as unique as these, and I would love to find an obscure swimming hole as pretty as the ones on Devil's Fork.

I woke up this morning still not entirely sure what I was going to do for the second day of my weekend swimming hole bonanza, so I decided I would go to Gragg Prong and maybe Harper Creek Falls if I finished early at Gragg Prong (in hindsight, I’m laughing at myself for thinking I would get finished early). I had visited Gragg Prong last year, but I had only hit the three main waterfalls of the trail. The trail goes high above the creek in some places, and I had caught glimpses through the leaves of whitewater and possible pools down below, but I had not had time to check them out because I also included Hunt Fish Falls on Lost Cove Creek in that hike, which ate up any time I might have had for off-trail exploring. Today I was going to forego Lost Cove Creek so that I could concentrate on finding potentially hidden waterfalls and swimming holes on Gragg Prong. After last year’s swimming hole treks, I started studying Google Earth satellite imagery for creeks I wanted to explore to get an idea of which areas I wanted to focus on and how close I could get via established trails. I had marked six points of interest (POIs) on Gragg Prong that I had not investigated last time, so my objective for today was to explore all six POIs and take pictures of them, because, as they say, "Pics or it didn't happen."

Before I get started, I want to go over some nomenclature for the main waterfalls to avoid confusion. In my previous entry on Gragg Prong, I referred to the first major swimming hole as the ‘bonus’ waterfall, and the waterfall with a tub in the middle as “Upper Gragg Prong Falls”. In researching the hike last year, all the sources I had seen referred only to Upper and Lower Gragg Prong Falls, and they ignored the bonus waterfall, or acknowledged that it existed but said it had no name. In the third edition of Kevin Adams’ North Carolina Waterfalls book, he refers to the bonus waterfall as Upper Gragg Prong Falls and the tub waterfall as Middle Gragg Prong Falls. I think that naming scheme makes more sense, so I am using it for this entry. In other words, the “bonus waterfall” or “bonus hole” in my previous entry will be Upper Gragg Prong Falls in this entry, and “Upper Gragg Prong Falls” from my last entry will be referred to as Middle Gragg Prong Falls in this entry. Confusing? Great! Let’s get started.

My points of interest appear as question marks on the map, and the known waterfalls are marked with blue pins:


( Click here for the full trip report with pictures and videos )

So yeah, I think this concludes my exploration of Gragg Prong. My curiosities for that creek are satisfied. Four of my six POIs turned out to be fairly unremarkable (albeit scenic), but two of them were legitimate swimming holes. I still maintain that the tub in Middle Gragg Prong Falls is the best swimming hole on the creek, and Upper Gragg Prong Falls is probably the second best (at least as far as aesthetics). The two hidden ones aren’t worth a trip to Gragg Prong on their own, but they are nice places to go if you are on the trail and want to cool off in relative seclusion.

Well, this concludes my weekend of back-to-back swimming hole adventures. I am about to sleep reeeal good. Until next time!