Donner Falls

DATE: Tuesday, April 7, 2020
DISTANCE: 6.39 miles
ELEVATION GAIN: 1500 ft.
TIME TAKEN: 4:09
MOUNT DIABLO STATE PARK
CONTRA COSTA COUNTY, CA
SOUNDTRACK: C.O.C.: Canyon Man

Donner Falls Previously Visited
• February 17, 2019
• January 1, 2020 

PHOTO ALBUM
MAP

"THE SEVEN GATES OF DIABLO" #2







It’s hard to keep a regular schedule under Coronavirus lockdown (not that I really had one before). No work, no band practice, no good reason to ever stay up late or get up early, no schedule… but today was ridiculous! I went to bed at midnight, and woke up at 2AM, unable to get back to sleep. I lay there, staring into the void until six, then decided I might as well get up and go for a hike. I had been itching to get out to Murrieta Falls in the Ohlone Regional Wilderness, because the last few days of rain had been decent, and they might be the last of the season for all I know. But what I had working against me was that Lake Del Valle near the trailhead was closed to the public, which would add something like an extra eight miles to the hike, and I didn’t even have a wilderness permit. So I decided to give up on that (maybe next year?) and take another stab at finding my way into the upper part of Wild Oat Canyon / Donner Falls on Mount Diablo.

 

I jumped in the van, drove out there, and was parked by the Rialto Drive gate before 7:30 AM. Because Mount Diablo State park is closed to vehicular access, due to the Coronavirus Pandemic, parking outside the neighborhood outside was a must, and conveniently, the Rialto Gate is closest to the waterfalls. TAKE NOTE: There is a two hour restriction on parking in this residential neighborhood on weekends. Through the entrance, and into the green spring grass I went, at 7:31 AM, and by 7:38 I was making my first crossing of Donner Creek. The park was lush, green, quiet, and devoid of human animals. It was a spectacular California spring morning. The weekend of rain had muddied up the roads quite nicely. Soon enough I was off the fire road, and onto Middle Trail, which was less muddy, but a more primitive environment. Wild turkeys and jackrabbits were about. Next it was onto the Falls Trail, and I could hear a dull roar in the distance of cascading water. There was a nice view out to some protruding volcanic rock across the canyon that I had never really noticed before, framed in by cascades of vegetation. The sun had yet to fully clear the rim of the canyon, so I was half in shadow as I made my way in. Going counterclockwise on the Waterfall Loop, I came to the first two minor waterfalls on my left. Light began shining in past the unnamed western shoulder of Mount Olympia above,  (I mistakenly thought this WAS Mount Olympia at first.) and by now I had gained enough elevation at the head of the canyon to have a look back to Clayton Valley and the hills beyond, illuminated in their vernal splendor.

The first major waterfall was soon sighted, as it pours out through a dramatic cleft in the volcanic rock. I came around the bend, and was soon behind this falls, and here is a picture of where the creek pours through that rock cleft and over the edge. A few more minutes and I came to a hairpin turn in the trail, which marked the arrival at the main fork of Donner Creek, and my signal to turn right on a steep, muddy hillside that barely looked like a trail. I had never successfully identified this turn until today, after two previous attempts in the past. Once up past the steep dirt slide, it looks like a trail again, albeit an unofficial one, and It brought me up right alongside upper Donner Creek Falls, which is barely visible from the main trail. Climbing a bit more, I was able to see that there is a single higher waterfall, which pours down into a double, lower one. Next to the big upper one is a sculpted, shallow rock cave. This was as far as the trail took me, but I had been itching for some rock scrambling, and I wanted to check out the volcanic crags that marched up the canyon.

I walked across the top of the lower falls, past the grotto, and climbed up unadvisable steep hillside that was composed of loose, damp, volcanic rock. I had to pull myself up by a tree root; to my left, I noted a much easier looking way that I could use to come back down. Now I was up in the rocky dreamscape of the canyon. There were faint use trails here and there, from humans or animals, and I wandered around, trying to see if there was yet an even higher waterfall above. I didn’t find one, but I had a good time looking around. I came back down the same way, only to find that my escape route was actually too steep for me to descend safely. Whoops. I had to wander around for another half hour looking for an easier way down. Finally free from the treacherous maze of rocks above, and back on the main trail, I took a moment to eat breakfast.

Continuing the loop of the Falls Trail, there were swell views back back at the cascades where I’d been. On the way back out, I took some pictures of the blooming wildflowers, with the intention of expanding my botanical knowledge by identifying them at home. I took a few trails I’d never been to before to get back to the gate: Wasserman Trail to Bruce Lee Spring Trail to Canyon Oaks Road. And that was it! I did not cross paths with a single other person on the trail that day, a successful social isolation hike. I saw two people in the distance on another trail, and I heard voices, but I never saw the source from whence they came. A fine day indeed, I felt a little crazy, but it was probably from the only two hours of sleep I got.

FURTHER READING
•Gambolin’ Man: He did just about the same thing I did, but describes it like a true poet. ALSO! I was under the impression that the Native name for Mount Diablo had been lost to time, because the natives were killed off before their name could be learned. But Gambolin has the answer! (Called “Tuyshtak” long ago by Ohlone people, meaning “at the day”)
•Bay Area Hiker: Description of the Waterfall Loop hike. Good info.
•Nor Cal Hiker: Another take on the Waterfall Loop hike.