BosnMate
Gold Member
- Sep 10, 2010
- 6,916
- 8,441
- Detector(s) used
- Whites MXT, Whites DFX, Whites 6000 Di Pro
- Primary Interest:
- Other
Yesterday we stopped at Clear Water Falls and the forest service has made a handicap trail the hundred or so yards to the water fall, so my wife was able to walk up to it. The falls are nothing spectacular like Yosemite, or Niagara Falls, but they are interesting just the same. Mount Bailey erupted in geologically recent times, sometime after Mt. Mazama (Crater Lake) erupted 6000 years ago. The lava flow from Bailey is several thousand feet deep according to the information I read at the falls. The lava is full of cracks and voids, and has become a huge aquifer. Water flows out of this aquifer 100 percent pure, about on mile upstream from the falls. The flow going over these falls are not affected by season, or drought, or flood, snow pack, or late fall, the flow doesn't vary by more than 3 or 4 cubic per minute. This flow forms the Clear Water River, which flows into the North Umpqua river in a few miles.
This is Mount Bailey, looking west across Diamond Lake. The falls are west of the mountain. Mount Mazama put out a lot of pumice, which I guess is called a pyroclastic flow. Anyhow the hiway cuts through deep pumice, until you get the the Mt. Bailey lava, and that's rock that has cut through the pumice.
The actual falls are quite wide, tumbling through the lava rocks.
Down stream from the falls.
This is the North Umpqua, the Clear Water joins the Umpqua here, just below my feet and to right, coming out of a gorge just as deep and unassessable as this photo. There is a bridge that crosses the junction and there was no way I could get a picture to the two coming together, it's a long way down, and I would have had to hang off the cliff.
This is Mount Bailey, looking west across Diamond Lake. The falls are west of the mountain. Mount Mazama put out a lot of pumice, which I guess is called a pyroclastic flow. Anyhow the hiway cuts through deep pumice, until you get the the Mt. Bailey lava, and that's rock that has cut through the pumice.
The actual falls are quite wide, tumbling through the lava rocks.
Down stream from the falls.
This is the North Umpqua, the Clear Water joins the Umpqua here, just below my feet and to right, coming out of a gorge just as deep and unassessable as this photo. There is a bridge that crosses the junction and there was no way I could get a picture to the two coming together, it's a long way down, and I would have had to hang off the cliff.
