Fall Creek, Henry Cowell State Park, Fall Creek, Light Through the Redwoods

Fall Creek, a unit of Henry Cowell State Park, is tucked into a steep arroyo, or water channel, with dense tree cover. Thirty minutes up the South Fork Trail, one comes to this cathedral-like vista. My artistic challenge was to capture the light effect flooding down the arroyo across volunteer paths surrounded by sword ferns, redwood sorrel, and winterberry and on down to the stream. At the same time, I wanted to keep

the viewer’s eye moving up the trail through the trees. Just a little over a century ago, the steamy smoke from the kilns and loud noises from the woodcutters, stoneworkers, barrel-makers, and oxen cargo wagons ceased with the end of the lime industry at Fall Creek. Today, the creek flows freely along the new growth redwood forest.