Indian Falls Snowshoe

On January 21st Randy and I met with our hiking friends Kathy, Gail, Dan and his dog Brownie, a chocolate lab. We decided to go up to Canada Lake area, and finding a place to park at the Kane Mountain trail head, met with everyone for the hike.

Having had relatively warm weather for the past few days, we had really firm snow to walk on, didn't even really need the snow shoes for the 1st 1/4 mile or so of the trail.
The trail goes along Green lake then passing the end, goes to Otter Lake. There, in dazzling sparkles from sunlight on frosted branches, you can see the little private cabin that sits at the south end of the lake.

The trail continued along Otter lake, till we got to the end of that, then we
started the "bush whack" part of the hike. Kathy and Gail had been this way a couple of weeks previously and spotted a small waterfall a mile or two to the north and east of the end of Otter Lake. That's where we were headed.


We really didn't have any difficult trail but the lakes tended to be slushy so we avoided snow shoeing up the lake and stuck to the wooded shore. There was lots of deer and fox sign. Brownie made it more fun because he would decide to move from his position as point at the front of the group, drop back to check on Dan at the end of the group, then, trying to pass everyone to get to the head of the line again, step on our snowshoes. It made the hike kind of interesting. The hardest part of the hike was the last 1/4 mile into the gorge to the waterfall. It was very steep and a little tricky but we finally made it.

Once there, the falls, about 20 ft high, was frozen over tho we could hear the water running under the ice. We took a lunch break there, Brownie going from person to person just in case someone decided they didn't want their lunch. Gail, as always, had many dog treats with her to give to our 4 legged hiking friend. She's always a favorite hiking partner.

After lunch, Randy managed to get the camera set up on a hiking pole on the ice and
he got a good group shot of us all next to the waterfall. Again, the hike out of the gorge a little tricky due to the steepness. Over the now well trod trail, it didn't seem to take any time to get back out and at the end, we walked out without snow shoes on the icy, hard packed snow of the last 1/4 mile. Over the course of the whole hike, each of us managed to do a face plant at least once, sometimes because Brownie was stepping on our snow shoe or due to a trip over hidden branches or a steep spot. All part of the fun!

Overall, a great 4.1 mile hike.