Waterfalls of the Keweenaw

Conditions:

Cold, sunny, very snowy

Companions:

Katie, Logan

Vehicle:

Saturn Vue

After a really productive visit to Marquette a week ago, Katie and I decided to return to finish up the waterfalls along Dead River before the end of the year. Leaving early in the morning again, we only made one short stop on the way east for a sick puppy and made it to Ishpeming by eight in the morning. Our first stop was Upper Carp River Falls, which is a series of three drops within a deep canyon near Semco Energy along US-41.

Katie decided to stay in the car after looking at the deep snow, so Logan and I waded into the forest through snow that came close to my thighs in spots. We couldn't tell if there was a trail leading back, so we simply waded into the forest in a generally eastward direction. After a few minutes we could hear the falls, and we bumped into the river after less then ten minutes of walking.

Carp River was smaller then I expected with most of it frozen. Marquette had received much more snow then Houghton so far in the year, and this area definitely showed it. Logan and I found the first falls a short bit downstream but couldn't get that close enough to the second ones for any good pictures. The third falls were almost completely encased in ice with some flowing water visible through a chute on the right. We headed back to the car slightly disappointed, soaked and cold from our snowy trek.

Our next stop was the lowermost drop on Dead River - Tourist Park Dam Falls. This dam had burst back in 2003, creating an empty basin and a unique waterfall near County Road 550. Also near this spot is Tourist Park, a city park with baseball diamonds, dog walks, and a playground. The falls were quite active, with the water flowing from the old basin over huge, rounded rocks to a rapid section of Dead River. You could see some remnants of the old dam here, a power station and a cement wall.

After Katie and I had checked out the falls and the nearby city park, we attempted to find the last dam overflow - Forestville Dam Falls. We finally found the right road after several dead ends, but saw a Private Drive sign and turned around. It turned out that the only way to reach this area is by hiking a good distance, something that the large amount of snow on the ground would have made rather difficult. Defeated, we headed to our next stop upstream, Dead River Falls.

This was actually our second trip to this area, with the first one occuring several months before. We had gone there with a few friends, and one of them hurt himself rather badly by falling down the riverbank. Katie and I were wary returning to this site, as the snow and slickened trails only made the area more dangerous.

We made it to the first falls rather easy, as they are right below the trail split, but the area was too slick to get a good view of the second falls (where the accident occured). We safely made it to the next three waterfalls, all of which were flowing high and looking very pretty with the snow piled up on the surrounding rocks. Katie decided to sit out on the last falls, so Logan and I headed upstream to the last drop alone.

I didn't have a topo map with me, so I made the incorrect assumption that there was a dam flowage pipe a short distance away from the river. We broke away from the Dead River but didn't find any pipes, so we stuck to the horizon line and hiked up and down the hills and hopes of finding an easier path. It wasn't until we passed the second falls that we finally saw the pipe, and we cut over directly and followed that out to the parking lot.

The rest of the day was spent warming up and shopping in Marquette. We were both quite frozen, and the other potential visits (Reany and Holyoke) were obviously covered in ice. We made it back to Houghton before the sunset, disappointed at only seeing three falls but happy to have made it out of Dead River okay.