Commonwealth Falls

December 27, 2013

A short and simple low elevation hike; just what the doctor ordered.  I had with me on this day a small group with some who have not done snowshoeing in years.  The reason I bring this up is this trail was perfect for them to get their feet planted firmly above the snow.  With 3.5 kilometers in distance to the waterfall, this trail only gains a mere 94 meters in elevation.

With flat ground and staying in the treeline this is a family friendly trail.  On this day we were followed into the trail by a small family and their dog.  For those interested (as I expect most are) the puppy's name was Archie, and what a gorgeous puppy!  In an attempt to keep this more about the waterfall and trail, I'll digress.

The hike (in this case snowshoe) in towards the waterfall is rewarding as you approach Commonwealth Peak in the distance.  On a nice clear, blue sky day you're aiming straight for it.  Though as you may be able to gather from the pictures and video, there wasn't much difficulty in this trail.  As a result the more adventurous person may think about over looking this on their trip.  I wouldn't discern them from thinking this way, as for us on this day it served a purpose to get us accustom to our new snowshoes.

For the waterfall enthusiast, the journey didn't offer us an amazing waterfall.  However I must caution that in the area of the waterfall there was a great deal of debris and washout from the June floods.  As you may see for yourselves there looked to be a good deal of damage to what could have been a really nice fluid waterfall.

Although as I don't have anything in the way of before pictures, on guide books or otherwise, I'm only left with speculation due to the volume of snow which covered most of the waterfall.  Perhaps a further trip will be needed once the debris is clear and I'm able to better decipher this in the summer months.