Unnamed Falls Keeney's Creek New River Gorge National River West Virginia Back in June 2016 I found myself running around West Virginia's New River Gorge with my good friends the Static Brothers. After visiting nearby Babcock State Park we decided to drive to Keeney's Creek a gorgeous creek that follows along and crisscrosses along the road to the Nuttallburg historic site. As we made our way down the road a decent downpour had secured itself above us and when we arrived at our usual pull off spot it was still raining, so we all pulled in and apparently everyone fell asleep listening to the falling rain. I couldn't tell you how long we napped, but eventually I drug my groggy self out of the car and stood around trying to wake up, followed a short time later by the others as they began to pile out of their cars too. This small falls on Keeney's is one of my favorite falls to visit when I'm in The Gorge usually because there's lots of leafy swirls at the base of the falls, on this trip I was really looking forward to shooting in with the vibrant spring greens. Several of us descended upon the falls but eventually everyone had moved on leaving me the last one there. I was looking for some new perspectives of the falls and as I backed away I really began to take a liking to a wide photograph of the surrounding landscape. I spent several minutes here before exiting from the falls and walking down the road to where everyone else had gone, a waterfall named Accept Reality. Being I have a substantial fear of heights I decided not to accept the reality of making my way down the 100ft steep wet bank and I chose to wait above for everyone to return. Maybe some day when I loose a little weight I'll make my way down to the towering beauty but for now we're just going to have to enjoy my photos of the smaller beauty upstream.
Laural Creek Tributary Of The Gauley River Gauley River National Recreation Area West Virginia What was hands down one of the coolest photographic subjects for me was on a tributary of the Gauley River at an unnamed falls on Laurel Creek in West Virginia. The hike down to the falls, although fairly short, was really steep, loaded with loose gravel and pushed me beyond my safety comfort zone but, wow, was it worth it. A beautiful towering waterfall with a massive double swirl in the splash pool and several great friends behind their lenses along the pools edge. Good times, I must say!
Uppermost Falls Marr Branch New River Gorge National River West Virginia For years now I've been trying to shoot the Uppermost Waterfall on Marr Branch along Fayette Station Road in West Virginia's New River Gorge and finally I got one I liked on my trip there this past June. What makes this waterfall so difficult to shoot, in my opinion, is part of it is under the rhododendron canopy and the other part is in an exposed open canopy making for some serious high contrast situations even on a cloudy day. Having decided to forego the decent down to the waterfall on Wolf Creek myself and good friend Bryan Janosick chose to head further up the road and visit Marr Branch. I really wanted to visit the taller falls further downstream from this falls but since we were here we went ahead and spent some time shooting it. Having seen the sketchy roadside decent to the larger falls I had no intentions of going that way and instead we decided to explore another option across the creek as we followed a faint path along the cliff side. Eventually the cliff side gave way to a steep but manageable slope of soft soil and decomposing tree matter and we began to make our way down. Bryan went first and I made it about 1/2 way down when I stopped and began to assess the landscape and I shortly realized that it would be a waste of time to go down. The wind generated from the towering waterfall had every leaf dancing around like crazy and since it was approaching sunset any shot we tried to take would just look like a blur of green. So we headed back the way we came and hurried up to the car to make a bee line for Beauty Mountain in hopes to capture a lovely sunset.
