What are some of your favorite hobbies? Aside from my love for photography, my other great love is spending time in the great outdoors. My husband and I like to go camping and hiking in our spare time, we will often backpack miles into a secluded place to camp with our two dogs pictured below; Xyla (left) and Benelli (right). They love being able to run free through the forest and play in snow, water, fields, etc.
When my husband and I go hiking, I really enjoy hiking to waterfalls. Waterfalls are one of my favorite things in nature and there is something rewarding about hiking to a beautiful waterfall. I have lost track of all the waterfalls that I have hiked to over the years. A few years ago as a Christmas present, my husband bought me a lens filter that is used to take beautiful long exposure photos of waterfalls.
One of my favorite waterfall hikes that we took was last February to Proxy Falls in Oregon. The main road to drive up to the trail head is closed in the winter due to snow fall. We were camping in the area last winter and Proxy Falls was on my bucket list. We parked at the road closure gate, which was about 2.5 miles from the trailhead. It had snowed about 6 inches the night before, so we put on our snow gear and strapped on our new snowshoes. As we walked up the snow covered road, we saw many rabbit and quail tracks. Once we got to the trailhead, the waterfall was another 3/4 of a mile. I stood in awe of how beautiful Proxy Falls was! The snow covered trees made it even more special. I snapped a few photos from the upper vantage point and then we continued down the unmarked trail into the ravine. The water was still a few feet deep, so it was good that my boots and snow gear were waterproof. It was very cold with the mist from the waterfall, although I still stood in awe and didn't want to leave!
As we headed back down the road to our car, we were looking around at our surroundings, and my husband shouts out to me that he saw a car down the hill off the side of the road. We stumbled down the hillside and come to what we believe to be an old Model T Ford from around the 1930's. Most of the engine had been stripped and it was quite rusted out, but was really neat non-the-less.
As we got back to the car, we were both tired and ready for a cup of hot chocolate. Our hike ended up being around 6.5 total miles. The next day we also hiked the shorter trail to Sahalie and Koosah Falls. Attached below are two photos of Proxy Falls, one from the upper view, and one from down at the base of the falls. The other photo is of the car as well as one of Sahalie Falls and Koosah Falls.
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