Colonial Creek Falls WA – Description | Location | Travel

Colonial Creek Falls might be the tallest waterfall within the continental USA. That being stated, it’s only mildly spectacular (particularly from a number of miles away).

Colonial Creek Falls Overview

The creek drops someplace around 2600′ in a long sequence of drops, slides, and cascades. While not a sheer drop like Yosemite Falls in California, it’s nonetheless not capable of having the tallest water within the nation so near home and viewable from the car.

We will in all probability try to get an up-close view of the falls in some unspecified time in the future within the not too distant future after which the ranking ought to rise considerably.

Colonial Creek Falls is the tallest waterfall within the continental United States. In a horizontal traverse of more than 4,200 feet (1,300 m), it falls 2,568 feet (783 m) vertically in 13 distinct drops, with an average incline of 65 degrees.

According to the World Waterfall Database, it’s the tallest waterfall in the continental United States, and is the fifteenth tallest on this planet, exceeding the more famed Yosemite Falls in height by 143 feet.

Colonial Creek Falls Description

Colonial Creek is, at first look, a reasonably discrete creek emptying into the placid waters of Diablo Lake’s Thunder Arm. But trying up its valley from the right locations one can glimpse parts of what’s up to now the tallest waterfall recorded within the continental United States.

As Colonial Creek drains from the lake forming instead of the retreating Colonial Glacier, it slides over the lip of the valley’s headwall, plunging and skipping a total of two,568 feet in 13 distinct steps before reaching the ground of the basin.

Because of the height concerned with the falls, in addition to the truth that there are a number of steps and breaks within the consistency of the gradient, the falls have a substantial general run (over 4,200 feet) which provides Colonial Creek Falls an average pitch of about 65 degrees.

However, many of the distinct tiers of the falls are over 75 degrees in slope, with the uppermost drop beginning out as a really steep horsetail, and the ultimate tier of the falls breaking into two distinct segments, every that includes a 300-foot sheer free-fall.

Our preliminary estimate of the height (2,584 feet) was derived completely from topographic information. When we surveyed the falls in August 2011, we had been solely capable of getting to inside about 3000 feet of the bottom of the falls.

Using triangulation and the coordinates from the place we measured from, we arrived at a revised height of two,568 feet. There is definitely a margin of error on this measurement, but it surely not more likely to be off by more than 50 feet.

Colonial Creek heads within the Colonial Glacier, which is sadly shortly shrinking and being changed with a small lake. The creek, although not massive in quantity, is pretty constant and does move all year long.

The falls, nonetheless, heading at over 5500 feet in elevation, typically stay half-buried in snow nicely into the spring and early summer because of the elevation, so seeing the falls fully uncovered and flowing at peak quantity is often not possible.

Colonial Creek Falls Direction

Take HWY 20 east to the Ross Dam Trailhead. Colonial Creek Falls will be seen to the southwest about 5 miles away coming down the face of Colonial Peak.

The Colonial Creek Falls will also be seen from simply past the bridge over the Diablo Arm of Ross Lake about 2 miles before the trailhead. There is outwardly a climbers’ path that runs up alongside the falls as nicely.

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