Fall at Falling Water Falls

After finishing the Pedestal Rock hike, there was one more nearby attraction - Falling Water Falls. Those falls might seem familiar to the few regular readers of this blog, this trip will be the third time I've been to Falling Water Creek this year. And the fourth time this year that I've been to the Richland Creek/Falling Water Creek area. But the falls are awesome, and just a short drive from Pedestal Rocks. We were in the neighborhood, why not make a quick stop?

We took a different route to the falls, visiting a few new locations. At one point we passed by a small pond that seemed to be filled with the reflection of a nearby hill. We stopped the car in the middle of the road and went to investigate further. The road is a dirt road located pretty much in the middle of nowhere, so we didn't think there would be much traffic. But as soon as Zack stopped the car and got out, a van appeared out of nowhere and impatiently waited a minute or so while the road was cleared. The driver had a slightly pissed-off look on his face. We would run into him a bit later when his van was randomly parked in the road, and we had to wait for him to get of the way.

But here is a shot of the pond. It looked much cooler in person, the picture doesn't do it justice at all.


Further down the road we came onto this old house and barn. It didn't look like anyone was at home, so we got out and took a few picture of the barn. I always get worried about stopping at places like this, since the people living there might not be too happy about people taking pictures outside of their house and rush out to greet us with shotguns or something.


We made it to Falling Water Falls, a great waterfall located just off the side of the road. There wasn't all that much water in the falls, but enough to make a nice waterfall anyways. But the fall color was coming along nicely up there...


The sun had dropped below the hills, meaning we had perfect light for taking waterfall pictures. I hurried and slid down to get as many shots of the falls as I could.


There was a nice carpet of fallen leaves along the shore...


I was surprised that there weren't more people out there, the falls are a popular place. Just one other car stopped by when we were out there. A family got out and stood at the top of the falls, peering over the ledge towards where I had sitting with the camera. It is amazing how little time people spend out at these places (or how long photographers stay there). But with the way clear I was free to take a few more pictures.


The benefit of the lower water was that I was able to hop across a few rocks to the opposite shore of Falling Water Creek, an area that I hadn't explored before. There is another way to reach this spot, but it requires going down a makeshift ladder down a tree by the falls. I've been a wuss and reluctant to try that, always imagining that one of the wooden planks would give way and send me and the camera falling into the creek or onto a pointy rock (or an unfortunate combination of both).

But there is a neat overhanging bluff there, giving a nice frame to the falls.


From there I strolled over and got this shot looking out from under the falls...


And a few more shots of the falls...




There is a neat area just downstream from the falls, where the creek cascades and tumbles over a series of rocks. It is hard to turn your back to the falls, but this view was nice also.


By then it was getting too dark to get shots. We had intended to try to hit Six Finger Falls along Falling Water Creek, but ran out of time. So reluctantly we headed to the car and started on the drive back home. I had hoped to make it back in time to catch a soccer game, but would end up getting back home in time to catch the second half. Given the result, it would have been better to have spent more time in the woods.

So this concludes our shots from an awesome Saturday in the woods of the Ozarks. Luckily for me, I had taken Monday off from work, and set off again to the hills for some more quality time with a few waterfalls...