Buttermilk Falls - John Case Brook

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George
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Another Greene County falls on a tributary to Kaaterskill Creek. The upper 2 cascades, shown here, are reasonably accessible from the Long Path. The upper falls is about 100 feet, and the second about 50. The third looked a little more dangerous to access, and I was running out of time. I'd like to return here when the flow is higher.
Upper Buttermilk Falls 1.jpg
Upper Buttermilk Falls 1.jpg (211.74 KiB) Viewed 10580 times
Middle Buttermilk Falls.jpg
Middle Buttermilk Falls.jpg (208.44 KiB) Viewed 10580 times
42 10' 33.5"N
74 4' 15.14" W
Last edited by George on Wed Jan 06, 2010 7:07 am, edited 1 time in total.
L_G_D
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Nice shots. There are so many Buttermilk Falls (couldn't they be a bit more creative?) - is this the one on the opposite side of the valley from Kaaterskill Falls? Near the Sunset Park development? The name of the stream doesn't sound familiar. The one I've been to has a trail, not sure if it's the long path or not, though it probably is, considering how it meanders around there. But anyway, you start at the lower end of the valley, walk along the old road that's now blocked off, that runs along the creek, past some houses, then up the hill. Once on top, you pass a couple ravines with waterfalls, and I think something called Poet's Ledge. Does that sound like the same place? As I recall, there's Hilyer Ravine and Wildcat Ravine which both have falls at the top.

Here's a google map of the area I mean, each of the streams running north into the valley have falls on them,

http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ie=UT ... 3&t=p&z=15
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George
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LGD - you've got the right one. I got the name John Case Brook from Dunn's book. Hillyer's Ravine is the falls he calls Viola Falls. These 3 falls - Viola, Wildcat and lower Buttermilk would make for a great bushwhack from below, starting somewhere near Fawn's Leap falls, then traversing along the base of each. I see that the ice climbers do it this way.
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OK, thought that was the one. I took some shots from the second or third falls a while ago - I'll have to dig them up, they might be on film. I had thought of starting at the top and going down and ending up near the bridge above Rat Hole, somewhere in that area.
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Another great set of shots. Thanks for posting these.... it's a great help for me.
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George
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Here's a panoramic stitch of the view from the bottom of the middle falls. The Long Path crosses just above the upper falls.
Buttermilk Falls Pano.jpg
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Dug up a couple shots of this one. First off, the standard shot of the first two drops. Didn't get down to the bottom of the next drop, which was right behind me when I took this.

Image

On another trip, my friend took along his climbing gear to rapel down a ways next to the first drop to get some shots. I scrambled down the hill a ways and got to a spot where I could get a shot of him getting a shot of the falls.

Image

One of these days we'll bring some climbing gear and follow the stream all the way to the bottom, I'm sure there's more falls like this along the way.

Here it is on Bing I count at least five more drops down stream.

Santa Cruz Ravine, the next one over never been to this one, since I think the top is in the private property area of Sunset park, but it looks like it might be accessible from the bottom without too much trouble.
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Matt
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excellent!
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