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Are you feeling brave today?

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CityLights

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Hiking to Pit River Falls, California.

You can view the falls from about 1/2 mile away at a vista point on HWY 299. There is no "official" trail down to the falls, but for the hike, you can take the long way or the short way.

The short way is a rock scramble down a 1000 foot broken cliff face with lots of loose rubble. Going down is not so bad, you can almost slide down on your but. Leather chaps recommended. Going back up is a real chore.

The long way is down a tole road built in 1910, purchased by the state of California in the 1930's and condemned in the 1940's when rock slides made it impassable. The government built an alternate route, HWY 299, but the original tole road remained public lands. The long way is about a 2 mile hike and you really have to know where you are going because the trail is not marked.

Well I took the long way. I am just about to the falls when I run into this...



Its a little more decrepit than I remember it from 20 years ago. Back then it still had a wooden deck. And look at that Volks Wagon Car size boulder in the middle of it!

Choices, choices... Cross the battered and condemned bridge or swim for it? Hurry up and make up your mind, as you can tell the sun is rising and once it touches the falls the photography is over!

Here's the falls gallery:

http://www.pbase.com/citylights/pitriverfalls

and one more shot of the bridge:



--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
Wow! What some people will do to get the picture! LOL
You are one brave soul to cross that thing! I'm NEVER feeling that brave! :-)
Beautiful pics of the falls! Thanks for sharing them.

You can never go wrong by doing what's right.
 
Port Royal Dad said:
...or at least to get some construction crew out to remove the rock!! :)
Click to expand...
Any funds to improve the trail and repair that bridge would be fantastic. With the falls as an endpoint to the trail, I am really supprised that it has not been done already. The trail and falls would make a new attraction for an area that is already big into eco-tourism.

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CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
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Great results as usual! Love the color shots of the falls! The monochrome - not so much.

The bridge doesn't look too bad from the end shot. But in that side shot, the structure looks really flimsy and the boulder looks huge! Am I right in assuming that you didn't swim the river with your gear overhead?
--
Yogi

When you get down to the 'nuts and bolts' of photography, the results depend on the 'nut' behind the camera!

See my 'Profile' for my current equipment.
 
Y0GI said:
The bridge doesn't look too bad from the end shot. But in that side shot, the structure looks really flimsy and the boulder looks huge! Am I right in assuming that you didn't swim the river with your gear overhead?
Click to expand...
There is only one viewpoint this shot could have come from, and I didn't get wet.

1/160s f/8.0 at 18.0mm iso100



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CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
The boulder was probably placed on the bridge to replace the weight of the decrepit wood planking (probably removed to reduce the number of fools who attempt to use it as a conveyance across the river), so that the bridge won't easily wash away (or blow away).
 
So this is what you get when you go back to your safe zone in landscape photography. A near death experience! Next time take a repelling rope with you and go down the face. Think of the images you'll get.

How did you process the water shot to give it the blue hue? I like it.
 
seigell said:
The boulder was probably placed on the bridge to replace the weight of the decrepit wood planking (probably removed to reduce the number of fools who attempt to use it as a conveyance across the river), so that the bridge won't easily wash away (or blow away).
Click to expand...
Maybe, but I don't think so.

Either some fool levered the boulder free from the adjacent rock face aiming for the bridge or that boulder just got plain lucky with gravity driving it.

Also bridge and foundation have huge impact marks. I don't think those were made by someone placing a rock gently on the bridge.

--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
I figure the bridge was holding up a 10,000 lb rock, what is 200 lb more?
sparkey2 said:
So this is what you get when you go back to your safe zone in landscape photography. A near death experience!
Click to expand...
The places that are still hard to get to make the best pictures. ;)
sparkey2 said:
Next time take a repelling rope with you and go down the face. Think of the images you'll get.
Click to expand...
Hmm... rock rapelling. Sounds like fun.
sparkey2 said:
How did you process the water shot to give it the blue hue? I like it.
Click to expand...
This one?
http://www.pbase.com/citylights/image/116561832

Now that you mention it, it is a little blue. This is a RAW development thing. I think I was trying to control the blown highlights by cooling down the color temperature in the RAW developer and got a little carried away.

Cooler color temperature makes the picture more blue, hotter color temperature makes a picture more red. Often for me it is the red highlights that blow out and if you cool the picture down, it saves the red highlights.

--
CityLights
http://www.pbase.com/citylights
.
 
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