The DCHS Gods compelled me to do a hike to the springs, or more acurately to the cliff across from the springs :-) The Bowen Ranch Road is hammered, thrashed, beaten to a pulp from the storms. The other smaller dirt roads where even worse. Finally made it to my parking spot for the hike. On the way into the canyon the rain let up just in time for photo time, those DCHS Gods must really like me. It was great picture shootin, and when I was done, the rain began again in ernest. Now thats timing :-) I sat on the cliff above the lagoon and the raging flood waters for about and hour checking out everything. As you might imagine, I was the only visitor to DCHS today ( 1-10-05 ). There is an amazing volume of water coming down Deep Creek, as you can see for yourself at the Wizard's picures link below, starting with the last photo on page 45, all the way through page 48 where the photo tour ends. The flooding that occured over the weekend reached higher than the El Nino big flood of 92-93, the highest level I have ever seen. The 92-93 flood went as high as the big brown metal sign. This flood went " up the bank "aprox 15 feet further by my estimation. The highest level looked like it was about 5 to 7 feet above the Aniversary Pool. It also went all the way up to the lone pine by the beach, across from the Crab Cooker. It shall be very interesting to see the changes along the creek once the flood waters receed. It was an amazing sight seeing all of that raging water. I finally headed back out of the canyon since it had been raining quite hard, and I knew I had to traverse the flooded dirt roads back to pavement. One interesting thing I found hiking back up the Bowen Ranch trail was globs of a clear jelly like substance on the trail, about 1 inch to an inch and a half in diameter. This clear jelly was always just below where a Choke Berry bush was above the trail. Its obvious it has something to do with those bushes. I don't know what it is, never seen any thing like that before after rains. When I first saw it, I thought it was some kind of sap, but when I touched it it felt like a Jelly Fish! Maybe it was Deep Creek Jelly Fish :-) Anyway had a great time seeing flooding at DCHS, probably higher than I'll ever see it again, it was truly and adventure to remember. PS-No Swimming Today In Deep Creek :-)