I have hiked around Ancient Lakes a few times, but this was my first time at Frenchman Coulee. The destination in this hike is to see the Frenchman Coulee Waterfall. There are actually 2 ways to get to the falls. One is a short hike downhill from the upper road, and the other is to walk the length of the Frenchman Coulee, which is 2 miles. I chose the latter and took a loop to get a better view of the coulee.
The Frenchman Coulee is a place for a lot of rock climbers to practice and test their skills. We could hear some climbers in one area but did not see them. On the drive down to the trailhead, we saw several campers and rock climbers. There are 2 bathrooms but neither had toilet paper. i imagine that since these are well used by all the climbers, the toilets had not yet been serviced for the day.
From the trailhead we could actually see the falls by zooming in my camera or using binoculars.
The wildflowers are still trying to start. There is new growth on some desert plants, some very small flowers covering the ground, yellow bells and a few other flowers.
Photo 1: picture of the coulee, showing the side cliffs and distant end cliff. The waterfall can be seen in this photo, even though it is almost 2 miles away.
Photo 2: Still about a half mile from the falls, this photo shows the top as well as the bottom of the falls.
Photo 3: sample of the flowers.
Photo 4: small ground plant starting to grow and bloom.
Additional photos are on my Facebook page: see link below
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