Park Service Clears Trail to Remote Waterfall

A newly cleared trail is bringing the first visitors to a 300-foot waterfall in Whiskeytown National Recreation Area.

The falls are tucked away in a remote corner of a 43,000-acre parcel of wild land administered by the National Park Service.

Russ Weatherbee, a wildlife biologist for the park service, said he had heard for years about a large waterfall on one of the forks of Crystal Creek, a stream that drains the western quadrant of the recreation area.

In 2003, Weatherbee found a logging map from the 1960s in the recreation area’s headquarters.

“Somebody had drawn a dot on one of Crystal Creek’s tributaries and labeled it a waterfall,” he said.

Later that year, he and a friend found it.

By this year, park service crews had cleared a nearly two-mile route from Crystal Creek Road to the base of the falls.