Hike to Feather Falls

Finally got everything coordinated to take Pam's birthday hike, and she suggested the hike to Feather Falls in the Plumas National Forest. None of us had ever been there, so we were all quite excited to be going to a new place. The drive was pretty easy, just long, about 2.75 hours. The location satisfied the rule that all hikes must be longer than the drive.
You can make a loop route, and that is what we did, taking the shorter 3.3 mile trail in and the 4.5 mile trail back. This was the perfect way to do it, as there were a lot of interesting wildflowers on the trail in and we had lots of energy to ooh and ahh over every one. We were on the trail for an hour and a quarter and had only gone about a mile. By this time it was 1.15pm and we were planning to eat lunch at the falls overlook, so we tried to step up the pace a bit. One of the things that delayed us was a snake convention.
The snakes were holding their convention at the Indian grinding rocks. We saw a dozen of these meter long garter snakes.
As we continued down the trail we ran into a friend of ours from town! What are the chances?
Eventually we came to a view across the valley of Bald Rock Dome. Continuing along the trail we reached the overlook for the falls, which allows you great views up and down the river valley. All cameras were busy. As we ate our lunch and admired the views a sudden roar broke the silence. A T-38 Talon supersonic jet zoomed just over the river, climbed the falls, rotated 90 degrees and zipped over the top of the falls. The roar and echo in the canyon were deafening.
The hike out was pretty but by that time my dogs were barking. Finished up the day by having dinner at Star of India in Yuba City. Another great hike!