Kentucky Waterfalls, Arches and Landscapes

Tempting Fate

This photo of a spring is the final photo I took on 04/13/2022. I'm thrilled that it wasn't my final photo period. The short version of my story is, "It was a dark and stormy night when I took a perilous boat ride. I got into that situation because I stayed too long at a cool place I found." Anyone interested in the full story may continue reading.

I spent most of the day checking out waterfalls which I had previously located by analyzing lidar maps on my computer. Along the way, I unexpectedly saw the double waterfall in the previous photo. The sunshine was too bright for taking waterfall photos at that time, so I continued on to my next planned locations. I returned to the double waterfall after the sun had dipped behind the hills. While taking photographs there, I was wondering how I could've possibly missed seeing the double waterfall on my computer maps. I checked the maps on my phone, and they showed no stream at that location. Furthermore, the contour lines showed no "low lying" area that looked like a stream bed. I guessed the water must be coming from springs.

I felt compelled to find the water sources, even though it was late in the day. I climbed above the waterfalls and found several springs. The spring in this photograph was running better than the others. It was the primary source of water for one of the waterfalls. Some of the other springs combined forces to feed the other waterfall. Time constraints kept me from looking for the top water source on that day, or fully investigating the ones I found.

This spring is near the base of a tall vertical cliff face. I suspect the hole to the upper left of the mouth of this spring also spouts water after a large rainfall. Someday soon, I hope to use a laser pointer or other light source to possibly see if the holes are connected. I suppose the lesser springs will run much better after a big rain. In that case, the smaller of the double falls could become much wider.

Impending darkness and weather concerns caused me to reluctantly leave this area before I had the full experience which I craved. I knew severe storms were possible that night, but it didn't look stormy yet. Unfortunately, I had been without phone service all day because I was too far away from a cell phone tower. So I didn't have a current weather forecast.

By the time I hiked back to my boat, my top priority was to reach the dock before it got too dark. With that in mind, I decided not to take the time to put on the poncho which I had locked away in a storage container. The first leg of my boat journey was uneventful. I used the Backcounty Navigator app on my phone to follow the original creek bed, which is now under a lake. That kept me away from any potential "shallow water" hazards. Once I reached a wider part of the lake, I expected to be able to travel at full throttle speed. That meant a further twenty minute trip to the dock.

As I approached the main channel of the lake, strong winds quickly became a huge problem. Whitecap waves began crashing into the bow of my tiny (12.5 foot aluminum) boat. The spray from those collisions was constantly drenching me. My short sleeved golf shirt and lightweight hiking pants offered little protection. My glasses and phone were so covered with water that I gave up on being able to see well enough to continue using my phone for navigation. My hands were otherwise occupied anyway. My bimini top was acting like a sail. I had to compensate by continually making course corrections. I was also quickly changing the throttle between idle speed, and slightly faster. My intent was to be at idle speed during each whitecap collision. Still, a tremendous amount of spray was hitting me, and a lot of water was being dumped into my boat. Fortunately, the bilge pump was able to keep the water level in my boat from reaching a dangerous level.

My progress was agonizingly slow. Eventually, darkness greatly reduced my visibility. I was concerned that I might soon lose sight of the shoreline. Fortunately, frequent lightning flashes started happening just in time to give me all of the light I needed to stay on course. Clouds diffused the light from the high lightning, and I didn't see any lightning bolts directly. However, I did hear one very loud clap of thunder. I was glad that I had previously installed aluminum tubes to replace some of the straps which hold my bimni top in place. My intent was to provide at least a tiny bit of lightning protection, but I knew it certainly wasn't up to "Faraday cage" standards. Regardless, I decided my best plan was to just keep going slowly, and hope for a happy ending.

I became distracted by the beautiful sight of the spray interacting with my bow lights. The spray was bright green on my right, and bright red on my left. It seemed as if I had a little bit of a Las Vegas water fountain display traveling with me.

I finally arrived at the dock at about two hours after sunset. The sprinkles started falling from the sky at about the same time. I ran up the boat ramp towards my little RV/camper van. Before I got there, the sprinkles turned into a cloudburst. Even though the air temperature was unseasonably warm, that hard rain was bone chillingly cold! I had to endure the assault from the sky while I got my boat secured on the trailer. Then I needed heat as fast as possible. I turned on the furnace in the RV, and nothing happened. Then I noticed that the thermostat said it was 82 degrees inside. I set the desired temperature to 83 degrees, and the furnace sprang to life. I was soon in dry clothes, and toasty warm. All is well that ends well!

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