Hocking Hills Day 3: Cedar Falls and Rock House

As mentioned in the last installment covering May’s trip to southeast Ohio, I spent some time scouting the Cedar Falls area of Hocking Hills State Park on Day 2.  While the main feature is Cedar Falls itself, I noted some other potentially photogenic scenes during the scouting session.  The light was not suitable for photography when I was scouting, so I planned to return first thing in the morning on Day 3.

I arrived at the Cedar Falls parking lot at daybreak; as anticipated, it was deserted.  It was an almost entirely cloudy morning which, given the subject matter, provided ideal soft light with no need to feel rushed.  If there was to be any issue dealing with crowds this morning, it would be at the main attraction–Cedar Falls itself–so I decided to photograph there first.  Then I would turn my attention to secondary features which would be of less interest to any tourists that might wander into the area.

Cedar Falls, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

Cedar Falls is a uniquely shaped waterfall; it splits in two around a large, protruding rock and then rejoins, forming a kind of oval of moving water.  It makes for a compelling center of interest, but the area immediately around the waterfall’s spillway makes it difficult to obtain anything but a straight forward composition.   There’s quite a bit of clutter in the splash pool below the falls and the layout of the area makes it effectively impossible to use the downstream creek as a foreground.  And the pool around the falls becomes quite deep very quickly, making getting close another impossibility.

Cedar Falls, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

I climbed into the pool, at one point, and shot the waterfall from a slightly more dynamic perspective than that of a traditional “head on” shot, but I’m not sure that it made all that much difference in the end.  I also played around with different focal lengths, with the intention of converting some of the images to monochrome.

Cedar Falls black & white, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

After shooting Cedar Falls from several spots with a couple of different lenses, I turned my attention to other photo opportunities.  I was immediately captivated by some maple leaves that I was able to isolate (sort of) with a long lens and a wide aperture.

Maple Leaves Intimate, Cedar Falls Area, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

I then moved to an unnamed waterfall that was flowing from a tributary of the creek that is created by Cedar Falls itself.  While this waterfall was less impressive in isolation than Cedar Falls, in a way I liked it better, because superior accessibility made it possible to experiment with more meaningful perspectives.

Unnamed Waterfall, Cedar Falls Area, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

This waterfall was in a fairly tight hollow which provided interesting sandstone walls–some of which were heavily covered by moss and lichen–to use as a foreground interest and/or leading lines.  It also made tight vertical shots workable.

Unnamed Waterfall, Cedar Falls Area, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

Wandering along the gorge creek, downstream from both of the waterfalls, more subtle compositions were available.  The walls of the gorge were at least 50 feet high in this area.  Every so often a bit of heavily diffused sunshine would partially filter into the scene, which made for an enchanting glow in the hollow that buttressed the creek when coupled with the spring greenery.  I wandered into the shallows of the creek bed to compose the image you see below, which to me felt like something out of Middle Earth.

Magical Hollow, Cedar Falls Area, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

It was still overcast and threatening to rain when I finished up in the Cedar Falls area and made my way roughly 20 miles to the northeast to the Rock House section of Hocking Hills.  Rock House is a fascinating cavern that nature has carved out of a towering (approximately 150 feet) sandstone wall.  It was starting to rain lightly when I arrived at the empty Rock House parking area, but I simply put on a light jacket and hit the trail.

I wandered down that trail through thick forest, and after 1/2 mile or so, arrived at a bridge that crossed a small gorge, leading to a rocky staircase that lay astride the towering cliff.

Rock House Trail Bridge, Hocking Hills State Park

After following the staircase several hundred feet, I came to what appeared to be the entrance to Rock House.

Rock House Entrance black & white, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

The rain had stopped some time ago and other park visitors were starting to show up in significant numbers, so I had to work around these folks after entering Rock House itself, but the effort was undoubtedly worth it.  Initially, it was almost impossible to see inside the cavern, except for those areas immediately surrounding portals and “windows,” but after a few minutes my night vision started to kick in and features became discernible.  Given the presence of several openings and increasingly bright light streaming in, the contrast inside the cavern was tremendous.  Exposure stacking was imperative and exposures necessary to reveal shadowed areas inside the cave were quite long.  Below is a shot looking out one of the “windows,” opening on the forest area.

Rock House Window, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

Given that I was bracketing exposures, with some of them lasting more than a minute, I had to wait for the cave to clear to shoot an image that looked from one end to the other (Rock House is approximately 200 feet long).

Rock House, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

I converted the image to black and white as well; I think it may bring out some of the details of the sandstone better than the color version.

Rock House black & white, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

After I wrapped up at Rock House, I spent the rest of the day wandering around the Cantwell Cliffs area of the park.  This section is set deep in a narrow gorge and is very heavily forested.  After an extremely heavy rainy period, this area might be of great appeal, but I found it to be the least interesting section of the park.  I only took a couple of shots during the several hours that I wandered around, including the intimate that you see below.

Forest Floor Intimate, Cantwell Cliffs Area, Hocking Hills State Park, Ohio

The weather turned again early in the evening as some thunderstorms rolled in and at that point I called it a day.  Day 4 would bring another set of adventures.

Next:  Day 4:  Storm Light