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Another in an occasional series of great state parks. Ricketts Glen is a fairly large state park west of Scranton and Wilkes-Barre; apparently chock-full of waterfalls (24 named on the Falls Trail). Here's a couple: This one's called Ganoga Falls; nice change-of-pace with black-and-white. At 94 feet, it's the tallest in the park. Nice small picture, no name given. Could be the same fall as the one below it (Murray Reynolds Falls). Murray Reynolds Falls: This last one was also taken at Ricketts Glen, not a waterfall, and it's 1/4 size (click for full-size). Nice desktop candidate.

Quintessential Alps and Switzerland. Two views. The waterfall is the Staubbach, about 900 feet high.

This is one that I've actually seen in person; it's just off Highway 4 north of Jemez Springs (near Los Alamos). There's a small hot spring, certainly from the remnant heat of the Valles Caldera just up the road, that created the "soda" (limestone) that makes the dam that is cut through by the Jemez River.

First one is from Kaphoto.ca, which has a LOT of pictures of Canada (mostly eastern Canada). This is Tews Falls in the Spencer Gorge near Hamilton: The second is a view of a rockfall from a dome eruption of Santiaguito volcano, from Photovolcanica's Santiaguito/Santa Maria Volcano page. This page has a lot of other great views and a short animation of a "ring fissure" eruption.

From this view, it might not seem to rival Niagara: But from this vantage point, it's fairly impressive.

Found this in the "waterfall" theme -- and only after taking a look at a few pictures did I realize this is another in my thematic category of waterfalls associated with columnar basalt! This place is almost beyond category in terms of geologic beauty. There are other pictures of the place on the Web; search with "Takachiho Gorge". Three views below. Note bridge at top for scale. And the rowboats, of course.

The beautiful Kjosfoss waterfall is one of the many stops on the Flåm Railway, which has been a major tourist attraction since 1940. The distance from the Flåm station, where the cruise liners dock, up to the Myrdal station is about 20 km (about 12 miles). The train winds its way along the narrow valley, climbing 864.8 metres (about 2800 feet) through 21 tunnels. Link to a larger image of Kjosfossen

Stromboli had a fairly powerful eruption on February 27, and this apparently breached the crater. A lava flow reached the sea. Tourist access to Stromboli is restricted. Below the image is a link to Volcano Discovery's Volcanoes of Italy page describing recent events. Volcanoes of Italy Norway's Latefossen provides an up close-and-personal view of some pretty strong whitewater: Acquired from Norsko 2005

Followers of the weekly Geopic will know that Iceland has quite a few picturesque waterfalls. But this one just makes my eyes widen a bit. Two pictures for demonstration. The first is a reduced-size desktop; click for full size. I guess they won't mind advertising.

First of all, another waterfall with basalt columnar jointing in Iceland (not a surprise, but another stop for the dream-trip itinerary): Aldeyjarfoss From childhood, I was always fascinated by the semi-precious gemstone tiger-eye. What is it? "Tiger eye is quartz that contains oriented fibres of crocidolite that have been replaced by silica. Tiger eye is displaying chatoyancy (a vertical luminescent band like that of a cat's eye) . Tiger eye typically has lustrous alternating yellow or brown bands." There's a word to impress your friends -- chatoyancy. Nice examples: Though yellow-brown-gold is the most common, tiger-eye also occurs in other...

1. I had not been paying attention to how active the Etna summit is again. "Etna Volcan Sicilien" covers it well (the link above to the November 2006 activity page has a 14-picture compilation). Two excerpts from it: 2. I accidentally discovered a picture of Haifoss, Iceland's 2nd highest waterfall. While the fall is nice, the view looking down the Thorjsa valley (headed by the waterfall) is amazing.

Saw a picture of Wave Rock the other day, and couldn't believe it was real. It doesn't get the same recognition as Ayers Rock, but it's pretty neat. You may not believe this is real, either: I read in the Travel section about Gocta Falls, declared to be the third-highest waterfall in the world (depending on how you define it). Basically, if you define a falls as a free-falling stream of water, the lower falls is third. If you define falls as a stream of water falling down, there are two long fjord-side falls in Norway that are taller, placing...

I guess I'm fascinated by waterfalls in volcanic terrain; here's another one with columnar basalt (Latourelle Falls, Columbia River Gorge): And as a bonus, I hadn't realized that Paterson Falls, New Jersey, was such a high-volume fall (and it flows over basalt, too!). I'm going to have to go see this one in the spring.

(I hope Danny doesn't mind the free advertising.)

I don't think this geological feature was in "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, even though it's near Mt. Ruapehu, which was in the movie. The waterfall is in Tongariro National Park, which features Ruapehu, Tongariro, and Ngauruhoe volcanoes. It's central North Island, in the Taupo volcanic zone, also near the Rotorua hydrothermal area. I'll be absent next week, so I have two pictures today.

Three pictures where art and geology intersect.

Last week's picture of McWay Falls, and research that found it, indicated that it's the only waterfall in California that directly enters the ocean (at high tide). Quite by accident, last week I also discovered a picture of the remarkable Spray Falls at Picture Rocks National Lakeshore, Michigan, which pretty much enters directly into Lake Superior all the time.

If you haven't heard of this place before, join the club. I discovered it while looking for other waterfall pictures. Apparently you will never find a picture of someone frolicking beneath the cascade, because the beach is off-limits. With good reason, I think -- it's astonishing. Geologically speaking, McWay Falls is the only place on the California coast where a perennial (year-round) waterfall directly enters the ocean. It is located in Julia Pfeiffer Burns State Park. Picture 1: Close-up Picture 2: The full scene

Last in a series of Iceland waterfalls; Godafoss. There are a lot of pictures on the Web of this one, and this might not be the best; try searching if you like this one. The center keel is actually split, but the center cascade is obscured by spray in the image above. This one shows it clearly: The reason I chose the top one is that it reminded me of some depictions of the Falls of Rauros, in Tolkien's Middle Earth, like this one (which is the depiction from the movie):

Continuing in an Icelandic waterfall vein (which I'll continue at least one more week), I discovered pictures of this one -- Svartifoss. Those of you who've been regulars for the Geology Picture of the Week know that I've got a lot of sub-interests, two of which are columnar basalt and waterfalls. Well, Svartifoss is two for the price of one! The picture is a nice artistic capture; there are numerous digital snaps of Svartifoss at various flow levels. Source: http://www.seewald.com/ Svartifoss is located in the Skaftafell National Park. Map: The linked page is where I found the map; it's got...

I accidentally saw a picture of this waterfall over the weekend, and tracked it down. The first image puts it in "landscape" context. This is size-reduced, click for the full-size. It looks very other-worldly. Doesn't this picture make it look like the river is flowing uphill? The second is a close-up with people for scale, unlike last week's lava falls.

This is one of the better pictures of the Upper Falls I could find. The Upper Falls don't get nearly the publicity or the views of the Lower Falls, but they are very dramatic. Because they don't get the publicity, they also don't get as much coverage by professional photographers, so a lot of the images on the Web are digital and don't really capture their beauty. Note the people on the edge-of-the-falls overlook for scale.

A two-fer this week; first, a picture of the strong Augustine eruption that happened Sunday. The linked page goes to the page with numerous IMPRESSIVE pictures of this year's activity. Part 2: "The River Wild" was on TV this weekend. I searched and found that the two rivers it was filmed on were in Montana. One of the rivers is the Kootenai River, featuring Kootenai Falls. According to the caption for this picture, Kootenai Falls at this stage is "runnable".

While sometimes I feature the work of professional photographers, I found these three at the linked site. Interested readers are invited to search and post their own favorites of these features, if so inclined. Lassen Peak Bumpass Hell Burney Falls -- a beautiful and unique waterfall I'd never heard of before

Though this picture isn't from the Web site below, the first picture I found of this waterfall is from the Web site below. The second link is Amazing Planet's picture of Chamarel Falls. Amazing Planet has a lot of great nature photography, and I may borrow a couple more from there in the future. Amazing Planet Chamarel Falls, Mauritius In other news, the link below is to the USGS site for Augustine volcano (Alaska). They have a Webcam located on Augustine Island itself. Every now and then (it refreshes every 30 minutes), you can get a glimpse of the...

WHISKEYTOWN, Calif. -- Dick McDermott knows these parts as well as any man can. But McDermott says he's never laid eyes on the nearly 400-foot waterfall that park officials recently discovered in a remote corner of the Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, 43,000 acres of wilderness in northern California. The 92-year-old used to earn a meager living mining the creeks that meander through the deeply wooded hills. He has slogged through the brush and hiked overgrown logging roads, hunting deer and gathering wood for his homemade fiddles. Water cascades down the recently discovered "Whiskeytown Falls, located in the Whiskeytown National Recreation...

Park officials find 400-foot waterfall in state's wilderness ---- WHISKEYTOWN, Calif. - Dick McDermott knows these parts as well as any man can. But McDermott says he's never laid eyes on the nearly 400-foot waterfall that park officials recently discovered in a remote corner of the Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, 43,000 acres of wilderness in northern California. The 92-year-old used to earn a meager living mining the creeks that meander through the deeply wooded hills. He has slogged through the brush and hiked overgrown logging roads, hunting deer and gathering wood for his homemade fiddles. "Sure, I was surprised," he...

WHISKEYTOWN, Calif. - Dick McDermott knows these parts as well as any man can. But McDermott says he's never laid eyes on the nearly 400-foot waterfall that park officials recently discovered in a remote corner of the Whiskeytown National Recreation Area, 43,000 acres of wilderness in northern California. The 92-year-old used to earn a meager living mining the creeks that meander through the deeply wooded hills. He has slogged through the brush and hiked overgrown logging roads, hunting deer and gathering wood for his homemade fiddles."Sure, I was surprised," he said from his home in the park, where he's lived...

Twin Falls, Idaho -- The waterfalls known as the "Niagara of the West" roared back to life this week for the first time in six years with the release of water from upstream dams to aid salmon migration. The increased flow over the 214-foot-high Shoshone Falls followed an unseasonably rainy spring in southern Idaho that filled reservoirs in the Upper Snake River Basin to more than 80 percent of capacity.

Link post: to provide a link to the "Geology Picture of the Week" thread in the FR "chat" section, where any discussion should be posted: Geology Picture of the Week, January 25-31, 2004

Here we all are at Rutt's Hut. Salutations to Wendy the waitress, who took such good care of us, and to the chef! Most of all to Coleus, whose idea this whole outing was.

Link Post: Geology Picture of the Week, December 8-14, 2002

Officials cut off waterfall to retrieve tourist's body In a highly unusual move, police on Tuesday began work to redirect a river that flows into a waterfall in scenic Geiranger. It's the only way they can retrieve the body of a Polish tourist killed when he fell into the waterfall last week. Geiranger in the spring: A scenic area that can be dangerous. The tourist was out hiking with a group in the area when he apparently stumbled and fell into the waterfall. None of his fellow hikers saw him fall, and he was initially reported missing when he suddenly...