The Falls on Lost Creek

Years ago, our family started a tradition of getting together for a reunion in July, on the Sunday closest to my Grandma Colyer's birthday. On this year, the event fell on the 11th, the exact date of her birthday, which took place way back in the year 1895.

I had made chocolate chip cookies as my offering for the party, and my husband and I had ambitious plans for the day. We tucked a hearty breakfast of steak and eggs under our belts, then set off on our three-part journey: Operation Cookie Drop, with three separate destinations in mind.

First, we would visit my older sister Pat, who is in a personal care home now. Second, we would attend the family reunion and possibly walk up to the falls. Third, we would visit my mom, as she was not up to leaving the house to attend an event. (Separate containers of cookies were prepared for each stop.) We hoped we could accomplish all of those things before the big thunderstorms would start later in the day.

We visited Pat, and I sat to chat with her under a pavilion by a beautiful central Pennsylvania backroad. We watched the Amish drive by in their buggies after Sunday services (and you might be seeing one of those just now except that I had left my camera in the car). I had not seen her in more than a year and a half, due to things being locked down there due to Covid.

I told her that we planned to go to the reunion, and that I was feeling sad about the fact that our big sister Barb would not be there. Barb died two summers ago, on the hottest day of July. She was not up to attending the picnic that year, but one of her best friends gave me her picnic offering at her funeral: four bags of Middleswarth bar-b-q potato chips!

Pat and I agreed that we missed Barb very much, and that she was a Force of Nature, able to move mountains to get things done for the people she loved. Without her, I must admit, my whole family feels a bit lost. And that's the truth.

From there, my husband and I headed up to the reunion, at a hunting camp my dad and brother and cousins belong to. They had the event last year, but my husband and I did not go. At the time, the Covid restrictions were very bad, and the State College area, where we live, was a great big red dot of danger, in regard to Covid numbers.

We felt we could not risk accidentally taking something down that might kill off any family members, so we stayed home. I think it may have been the first reunion I have ever missed, and I felt so bad about it, like I was betraying them somehow.

We were among the first ones to arrive on this day, and we hung out and greeted people and finally agreed at around 3 pm that it was time to walk up to the falls. A huge group of Mennonites had gone there before us, somebody said 12 car-loads!

And we did indeed encounter them on the hike up to the falls: a neat row of young men, followed by a neat row of young women, clad in long dresses and wearing the white hair nets. (I'm really sorry I missed getting a few photos of this group actually AT the falls, as that would've been something!)

My little sister and her daughter crossed the stream, walked around the big rocks on top, and came down on the other side of the falls. They had to leap like gazelles to get from rock to rock, and finally across. I held my breath (and took pictures!) as they leapt.

The temperature wasn't too bad - high 70s - but the humidity was killer. Every rock oozed with moisture, and rocks, sticks, and tree roots were slicker than you can imagine. My cousin's adult daughter slipped at the edge and fell in, sliding and sitting down neatly in the water. Ker-splash!

Her daysack helped cushion her fall, but she tore a hole in her pants and got scratched up and knocked about some. Then each of her children took turns falling in, but they didn't land quite as hard. (It reminded me of that one year that Barb fell in the creek; as I looked back, she just . . . tumbled right in!)

We camera people were snapping away on our shutters like a bunch of shutter-bugs. So here is my main photo for the day, of the falls on Lost Creek. It is within walking distance of the home where I grew up and where my parents still live.

Technically, the falls is private property, and it is a best practice to obtain permission from a camp member before going to the falls, but the locals are so used to going there over the years that most of them don't even bother asking or checking in.

To be honest, this is met with mixed emotions by camp members, who are reluctant to discipline those who disregard the No Trespassing signs, but a little edgy about so many people using their property, sometimes doing destructive acts, and leaving litter or fire rings behind.

We pulled the soaked ones out of the creek, and everybody walked back down to the camp, where we had a delicious potluck meal. And I can't believe at this point that I didn't take a single picture of the array of food! The desserts! The baked beans! The bbq chicken! The deviled eggs! The mac and cheese! Did I mention the desserts?

My husband and I sat at a little table with my dad and marveled as he snarfed down every bite, then went back for desserts. He and my little sister fixed plates of leftovers to take back down home for Mom and Dad to enjoy later. Then there were family photos taken, and my husband and I hopped in the car to go visit Mom.

And that was my final Cookie Drop. I left two dozen chocolate chip cookies in a container with them, and we sat and visited for more than an hour. Which was too long, as you will find out (in regard to the weather); but also, as a daughter, and one who hardly ever gets there, it was not nearly long enough. There is never enough time to hug your mother as many times as you want to. But I gave it the good ol' college try!

We dallied a bit, I'll admit it. And that put us straight in the cross-hairs of the big line of thunderstorms that hit us right around the Laurel Creek Reservoir in the Seven Mountains. (It's actually seven MILES of mountains, not actually seven different mountains.)

The rain was mild at that point, and it must have just started there, as mist was rising off the reservoir like angels into the night. It was beautiful and strange and phantasmagorical, and I just sat in my passenger seat and shouted out "WOW!!" and "AMAZING!" at every turn, like I was watching a fireworks show. It was one of the loveliest things I have ever seen.

And then the wall of water hit us, and it was white-knuckle driving for the next half-hour. Between the Seven Mountains and about Boalsburg, the water rocked us, and the car wheels made funny sounds that, as it turns out, meant we were hydro-planing.

We all slowed down. Everybody put on their lights. We drove like we meant it, each one following the tail lights in front of us. I thought about cracking a joke with my husband about how I might need to go shopping for some salvia (see stories here and here), but I didn't think he'd appreciate it much! (And to be fair, the winds on the Mazda Hell-ride were much, MUCH worse than the winds we encountered on this day. But the water was comparable.)

And then finally, around State College, the rains were letting up. When we got to Stormstown, it was hardly raining at all. But our next-door neighbor had another tree down blocking part of the road. In one of the most recent storms, he lost a tree that DID block the whole road. He's had quite  a week. And yes, when you live out here with all these trees, you might as well keep a tree service on retainer, because, buddy, you're gonna need one!

In the end, we made it safely home, all missions accomplished, all parties visited! It was a lot. It was a long, long day, full of family and exercise and woods and waters and fresh air and terrible thunderstorms and even danger. But in a way, it felt very good, the way that visiting family always does. And anytime I come back to the falls at Lost Creek, I feel like I am coming home.

My soundtrack song is this one: John Denver, with Back Home Again. (And yes, he talks about that "storm across the valley"; that's the one we drove through to get home!)

I've put a photo of my dad and husband in the Extras. I was trying to get a decent photo of my dad and his sister, my Aunt Dorothy (Aunt Ella Mae fell and broke her shoulder a month or so ago, so alas, she was not in attendance this year). And I had my camera out and was trying to get them to pose, when my dad started leaping toward me to thwart my efforts. He gave me his bad-little-boy grin at the end, which is now captured on film forever. That's my husband sitting off to the left, watching with some level of amusement.  :-)

Here is the whole boxed set of all of the family reunion blips:
Caution: Ent Crossing - 7/8/12
My Father and His Two Sisters, Laughing - 7/14/13
Cool and Green and Shady - 7/6/14
A Walk to the Falls - 7/12/15
The Belly Laugh (a personal favorite!) - 7/10/16
Family Reunion: My Father and His Two Sisters - 7/9/17
Wooden Bridge Across Lost Creek - 7/8/18
My Three Aunties - 7/14/19

P.S. Update, added the next day: the National Weather Service confirmed a microburst in Poe Valley State Park, just a few miles from where we were driving on the Seven Mountains, around 7:30 pm on Sunday night! We are lucky to be alive! More info, and links, on the next day's blip. . . .