Tanner Creek Streamlet | June '06

This is one of several little waterfalls located upstream from "Munra Falls" (the stream that drops next to the first footbridge on Tanner Creek). Still a memorable trip - a horrendous thunder storm erupted after I had spent a couple of hours up there and SOAKED me on the way back down to the trailhead - but well worth it, of course!

Comments and suggestions welcome!

Tom

Olympus E-300, 14-54mm lens at 14 mm, 1/2 second, polarizer

Wow! That is a sweet area up there, Tom - glad you braved the elements to share this! I've looked up at the tops of those falls many a time wondering what was "up there!"

Well, given your waterfall obsession, you'd definitely like it up there, Ned! There are five small waterfalls located in close proximity on two forks of "Munra Creek", just upstream from the "old" Tanner Butte Trailhead, (which is now a 2 mile hike up Tanner Creek Road - I got there by hiking up from the Wahclella Falls trailhead). The waterfalls are within 1/8 mile of the old trailhead, but are probably dried up little trickles by now. Definitely Springtime material. There's also a TALL waterfall just downstream from the old road, but it was too scary to explore - it's surrounded by a ring of cliffs in the 50-100 foot range, and the falls itself looked/sounded to be in the 130 foot range. All of this is high up on the canyon wall, probably 500 vertical feet above the lower "Munra Falls".

Tom

Woah, Tom, we're definitely going to have to do a waterfalls trip this spring. As Ned's unofficial waterfall student, we all should go.

And as an aside, it would be nice to bub around the next your team wants to discover more waterfalls

Kevin

Beautiful, Tom. I like the mass-foliage framing around the falls. I'd contemplate taking a bit off the top to draw the viewer further to the main interest.

I recognize that fall, tom, right near that trailhead. I was tempted to explore up that tanner butte trail myself after my infamous upper tanner creek falls/miracle mile trip, but I was finished when I walked back past this area! I actually thought that this was the creek that falls into the gorge between the two tiers of wachlella falls, but that was just a guess. I know what you mean about that nice 100 footer or so just below the trailhead. I got a peek at it through the trees but the faint trails leading off the right side of the road seemed treacherous indeed. If we go back up there, it would be worth a length of rope, and I'd be willing to haul a lot of it, as the next time I go up, I'll be on my mountain bike for the extreme trip down the road!

Great shot by the way, excellent lead up to the main falls through that lovely slide.

As far as right down the middle comps go, this one is pretty nice. It has good flow..oh that was a really bad pun.

Nice lush scene Tom. I agree with cropping a smig off the top; Right below that darker area in the center.

Thanks for the comments - I'll try the crop suggestions. Several mentioned visiting this falls, and so I'm attaching a map that I put together for the Portland Hikers site last year, when I was describing the details of this area. The insets give you an idea of the various little falls in this area - they range from fairly photogenic to extremely photogenic! The waterfalls are all too small to warrant an official name (with the possible exception of the big drop below the old road), so these are just for the purpose of differentiating them. The falls posted in this thread is No. 5 (Maidenhair).

All become trickles in summer, so the best window is sometime in May, when runoff is pretty good. I approached by taking Trail No. 400 (Gorge Trail) from the Wahclella Falls trailhead east to Tanner Creek Road, then the road to the very obvious Tanner Butte Trail. The map shows the vicinity of the Tanner Creek trailhead.

Tom

I've got to see what I can do with these next year.. thanks for sharing the info, Tom..

I'll look forward to seeing your shots, Ned! They're all pint-sized (10-25 feet) but have a lot of character. No. 6 is the most challenging - it's a bit further off the trail, but with a decent flow, and could be a very pretty scene. I simply shot it from the trail with a telephoto to document it. That branch of the creek (which includes No. 3) has a very small flow, so would suffer the most in a low water year. The other (north) branch of the creek has 3-4 times the flow of the south branch.

Tom

That's a pretty falls, Tom. The log and lush greenery surrounding the water there add to the composition.

Do you use a special software to create these strip maps? (By the way, that's a very well done graphic.) I always find these posts of yours interesting and informative.

I just use Adobe Illustrator, Mike - pretty basic. Glad you like my obscure locales..!

Tom