Kaskaskia Canyon Icefalls

 

The last canyon on our trip was Kaskaskia. This canyon is very close to Ottawa Canyon, only about a five minute walk away, so it had quite a few people visiting while we were there. Again, people give these icefalls some scale - some falls seem so small until you view them with a person standing nearby.

T This waterfall isn't very tall, but the two logs that were washed down the canyon during some past flood add a lot of interest to the image. Behind the fall is a cave that we usually don't venture into because of the story I heard from a friend who fell through the ice here into the water below that was up past his waist. On this visit, we noticed several other people walking around that area, and with the two weeks of very cold temperatures, we knew the ice was thick enough to support us.

 

While typically not a canyon for ice climbing, I have seen a few people climbing this icefall in the past, and this year, a family with climbing gear and helmets were approaching was we were leaving. I would think this is a good fall to climb for beginners, and also for experienced climbers who don't have the ability to fasten lines to the trees above. This fall would be challenging enough, and if you did slip, you wouldn't fall 80 feet to the canyon floor.