Reflections on the Fifth Week of Summer – Hells Hollow Adventure

Tiger Lilies

Wednesday afternoon, as soon as Spence pulled to the fence edging the root-rutted parking lot, I grabbed my camera case, hopped out of the car, and hustled to the head of the Hells Hollow Trail. The McConnells Mill State Park pamphlet advertised an easy half mile walk to Hells Hollow Falls. I would make the walk and get a photo of the waterfalls. I pulled the camera out of its case, hung the camera around my neck, and hung the case on my shoulder. Ready.

Just fitting under the angled roof over the trailhead sign, a large-framed man studied the park map.

Spence locked the car and ambled to the sign. “How’s it going?”

The man put his finger on the map, looked over his shoulder, and said in a rich voice made for radio, “Are you from around here? Driving here, I passed signs for Wampum and Wampum Underground. What’s the story behind that?”

Okay. Not ready.

After Spence explained our Wampum ignorance, the fellas chatted about Cincinnati where the vacationer worked as a police officer and had “seen it all.”

Splotches of orange two yards behind the sign caught my eye. I waded through weeds, crouched, and angled my camera lens toward nodding tiger lilies. No bugs.

Earlier, after Spence and I had toured the Old Mill, I focused the camera on surging Slippery Rock Creek. A black bug, two millimeters long, crawled across the blue sky. I turned the camera away from my face to study the lens. No bug crawled on the lens. I focused again. Two bugs crawled across the sky.

Balancing the camera case on the railing twenty feet above the white water―not my wisest move―I searched for lens tissue. Setting the case on the hillside patio and stepping back from the railing, I gently wiped the lens and focused again. Three bugs. Were bugs hatching inside the lens? After unscrewing the lens, I swiped it with lens tissue and an air brush. Then I puffed air into the camera innards―camera facing the ground to enlist gravity’s help. I reattached the lens and focused.

Two bugs crawled across the view screen.

“Bugs are ruining my picture. Sheesh!”

Spence took the camera, detached the lens, and studied the parts. Handing me the lens, he flicked the single reflex mirror with his thumb then attacked the inside of the camera with tissue, air blower, and air brush like I had.

I paced the patio, squinted at the blue sky without crawling bugs, and fretted that I might have to take photos with my not-as-sharp, cell phone camera.

After his third round of cleaning, Spence turned the camera’s open-innards toward the ground and shook, shook, shook. Putting the camera to his eye, he said, “Got it.” He handed the camera back.

And, when I peered through the lens at the tiger lilies, no bugs. I got sunlight shining through orange petals. Perfect accents to the sunny, blue-green summer day.

When I stood, my stiff knees unfolded begrudgingly.

The vacationer’s wife and two elementary-school-aged children had joined Spence and his new friend.

Bouncing on her toes making her pigtails sway, the daughter asked, “Can we stay when we get there?” The thirty-something mom’s yes sent the girl skipping down the trail. The dad and older brother followed.

Before joining them, the mom stuffed car keys into her shorts pocket and flashed a friendly smile at me. “Happy Birthday.”

Returning her smile, I said “Thanks” then gave Spence, who must have divulged my birthday status, a why-did-you-do-that raised-eyebrow look.

“Come on, birthday girl.” Spence held his arm out as if ushering me to his side.

Hells Hollow Trail Bridge

We strode into the woods and across a wooden bridge over Hell Run. The shallow six-foot wide stream gurgled over rocks and pebbles. Cardinals sang birdie-birdie-birdie. Maple leaves and towering hemlocks filtered sunlight. Our feet padded along the wide, gravel trail. Equipped with benches placed by scenic views of Hell Run, the trail proved easy to follow and easy to tread―for Spence and the Cincinnati family.

Half way to the falls, my knees stung as if attacked by a horde of angry yellow jackets and my hips throbbed. I slowed to toddler pace.

Spence, who’d out distanced me by twenty yards before noting I’d lagged behind, rushed back. “Are you hurting? We can go back.” He pulled the camera bag off my shoulder and hung it from his.

I took a calming breath. “I’ll make it. I can rest on the next bench.”

A young woman sat in the middle of the next bench.

“She’ll make room for you,” Spence said.

But the sound of the falls―like the simultaneous flushing of a thousand industrial toilets―enticed me forward. “I can make it.” I hobbled to the top of steep, open-back, wood steps that ended in the water. The Cincinnati mom waded. Her husband and children scrambled up the hill on the other side of Hell Run. Did I trust my stiff knees on the stairs? “You go first,” I told Spence in my teacher voice.

He descended two steps then turned to make sure I’d followed.

Clutching both handrails, I had.

We slow-stepped to the bottom.

He splashed into two inches of water then waded to a gravel bar beside the stairs.

I started at the water, at my hiking shoes, and back at the water. Preferring not to spend the rest of the day in wet stockings and shoes, I ducked under the railing. Landing on moist gravel and sand, I straightened to a side view of the falls. They spread in an arc across the stream. To get my anticipated photo, I would have to wade to the middle of the stream.

No extra clothes in the car.

Dinner at a restaurant to follow.

I wouldn’t, couldn’t wade.

My face must have registered disappointment because the Cincinnati mom waded to me. “Are you all right?”

Her family crab-walked down the hill to the creek.

“Yeah. I just can’t get a photo of the falls from here. I didn’t bring wading shoes.”

She swiveled and pointed to a fallen tree stretching three quarters across the stream. “You can hold my shoulders and walk along the log.”

Her son slid the rest of the way down the hill and walked, with mud-covered shorts bottom, across the log. His confident feet angled out. I marveled that he didn’t raise his thin arms for balance. In mud-free shorts, his sister and dad followed with arms out like penguin wings.

Wet, with a tinge of green moss, the log looked precarious to me. Besides, I’d have to wade through two feet of Hell Run to reach the log. “My log crossing days are over.” I sighed and asked for a different favor. “Would you take the picture for me?”

She studied my camera. “I don’t know how to use one of those.”

After a thirty-second tutorial, she took the camera and swished to the middle of the waterfall pool. She pressed the shutter release, moved a few steps, and took another picture. After her fifth picture, she swished back. “Check them. If they aren’t okay, I’ll take more.”

Hells Hollow Falls - photo by Cincinnati Woman

I squinted at the camera’s small view screen. Lots of white splashing water. One photo revealed five separate levels of the cascading waterfall. “This one is great.” I angled the view screen so she could see. “Thanks.”

She flashed a sunny smile and swished away.

Beside me, the edge of the waterfall trickled down rocks. Between the trickles and the thundering main falls ran a curtain of streaming water. The contrast and sparkles might make an intriguing picture. Like the woman had, I took photos from several spots.

My smarting knees and throbbing hips made me wonder if the young woman had vacated the bench at the top of the wood stairs. With Spence following, I limped to the top.

The woman sat on the bench with a young man. A woods date, no doubt.

I rested my fanny against an uncomfortable rail fence.

The young woman jumped up. “Would one of you like to rest on this bench? We’re done.”

Before I could lie that the fence worked for me, Spence answered. “She needs to sit. I’m fine.”

The couple ambled off, and I collapsed onto the bench.

When I’d rested on a second bench, still deep in the woods, the air cooled and the sky darkened. Sprinkles pinged my glasses. I snatched the camera case from Spence and tucked the camera inside. Clutching the case to my chest and bending forward, I stood. No time for dawdling. Despite crouching, I strode up the trail with Spence.

Raindrops beat overhead leaves like wood sticks hitting a snare drum. Thunder rumbled. Wind bounced branches.

By the time we reached the trailhead sign, thunder crashed, lightning flashed, and rain power-washed our backs. Ignoring old knees and hips, I dashed to the car and dove inside.

Pea-size hail hammered the windshield.

Spence ducked in the driver’s side door.

Fog clouded the windshield.

Pushing wet hair off my forehead, I made a birthday wish for our Cincinnati friends at the falls. May they return as safely from their Hells Hollow adventure as my bug-free, dry, waterfall photos.

Hells Hollow Falls Side View