California 04/2008 - Day 8

We decided to leave Death Valley a little earlier than planned and head back toward Mount Whitney, but wanted to stop at Darwin Falls on the way out of the Park. In many ways this was the highlight of the entire trip.

Uncharacteristically, we stopped at the Ranger Station and got some general information about the Darwin Falls area that was to prove very helpful later in the day.

We made our way to the Darwin Falls trail head, and it was pretty much like Marble Canyon that we had hiked up the day before. There was one difference though, there was a pipe that carried water from Darwin Falls all the way over to Panamint Springs. Darwin Falls is spring fed and flows year round. We knew there had to be water up there somewhere, but we didn't see much evidence of it at first.



As we progressed up the canyon, we began to see some greenery, the further up the canyon we got, the more and more green it got. Pretty soon, we saw actual running water. This is quite a treat in the desert. The green brush turned into cottonwood trees, and boy where there a lot of them.



In the course of less than a mile, we had gone from dry desert to a lush green oasis. We got to the first waterfall, and there was a nice deep pool there.






As we entered the canyon, we saw some folks who had appeared to have just been swimming. They must have taken the waters in this pool. We were confused because this waterfall did not look like the pictures we had seen of Darwin Falls.





The canyon was pretty much of a dead end at this first pool, so we pulled out the guide book and saw that it did continue on, but required some fairly serious rock scrambling and warned those who were uncomfortable with heights to stay away (that would be me).



Wade searched out the way and shamed me into to climbing up and around the falls on narrow ledges.





We got back to the canyon floor and soon came upon the second water fall. It had a deep pool that was very much an oasis in the desert.



We continued on up the canyon, making our way through, around and under the dense cottonwood trees, crossing the flowing creek many times.



A little further on we came to the third and fourth falls, with more inviting pools of water.

The canyon seemed to be blocked, and we wondered if we would ever see Darwin Falls, as this falls was not the one pictured in the guide book. We dug the book out again and found the secret way around the falls, up through a scree field and through an opening in the rock, and we had arrived at our destination - Darwin Falls.



Darwin Falls is about 100 feet high, and the water falls into a series of clear, deep pools.



After the usual photos were taken, we realized how hot and sweaty we were as a result of the hike up the canyon.



We mutually decided to take to the waters, so off with the clothes and into the cool, cool waters we went. A desert oasis it really was.





With a climb up a rock ledge, we took a little sun and worked on the tans. Being careful not to take too much sun (as we had done on an earlier trip), then we dressed and headed down the canyon and back to the H3. We found some side trails and explored them, which lead to this view point of Darwin Falls and the canyon.


Remember the tree at the top of the falls, as we will eventually make our way here from the top side.



We loaded up the H3 and proceeded on toward an area called the China Garden. The Ranger man told us about the gold fish pond and that we needed to keep taking right turns as we continued up toward the town of Darwin.

Back in my mind was the idea of finding the top of the canyon that feed Darwin Falls and hiking down to the top of the falls.

We found the China Garden and sure enough there was a spring fed pool there that was full of large gold fish.





This area had apparently been a mine at some point. We had lunch here and finished off our beer. I should digress here to decry the limited beer selections we were able to find in California. About the best we were able to find was Alaskan Amber, Fat Tire, and Sierra Nevada. One would think that California would just be loaded with good micro-brews, but this doesn't seem to be the case.

We began the second stage of our hike down a canyon that we believed to be the source of Darwin Falls. We started the hike much as before, down a very dry wash, absent of any greenery. We topped a hill and the entire valley floor was lush greenery, with scrubs and cottonwood trees. A little confused, we searched around a little and continued making our way down the canyon. It was so green with a running creek that we knew this had to be the place. Several times we thought we had reached the end of the trail, seemingly blocked by rock walls, etc. Wade was the true adventurer and always found a way up, around, over, and past the obstruction. We finally came to a spot that the Ranger had warned us about. It was drop off that would require some rock climbing equipment (skills) or additional assistance in order to get back up it on our return trip. We figured and looked and studied and finally decided that we could make it back up with each others assistance. We slid down the rock wall and continued down the canyon.

Finally, we reached the top of Darwin Falls.


Here's the view from the top of the falls looking down at one of the pools.





Took our photos, just as the camera battery seemed to start failing. Then we hiked on out of the canyon. The tricky spot was indeed tricky. Wade could have probably made it back up by himself, but I gave a little push from below and he made it up. Me on the other hand, had to have a good pull or two from Wade to get me up and over the obstruction. We hiked back to the H3, and decided to forego our drive on up to Darwin and head instead on to Lone Pine and pizza and beer.