Hocking Hills, day 2 (hike Cedar Falls to Old Man's Cave and back)

Despite lack of opportunities at home, once they are exposed to a single-room residence with full access both dogs become fully convinced they are bed dogs.
For Tali, this involves softly leaping up and gently inserting herself into the hollows between bodies like a feather drifting to earth.
With Dozer it feels as if an elephant landed on your leg. Then stepped on your ribs. Then licked your ear. Then planted its gigantic a$$ on your chest (and that is if you are lucky- otherwise it is your head). And if you open your eyes to protest, you see him standing over you, head lowered in wolf-stare and gently drooling on your face.

Today is gonna be the most sleep-deprived hike EVER.

We went back to the Cedar Falls trailhead this morning with the plan to hike from there to Old Man's Cave, break at THAT trailhead for lunch, water refills, and bathroom breaks, then hike back.  I had a combo backpack and hydration pack with snacks and my camera and a bunch of dog basics, and Brian carried several liters of water in his backpack as well as his camera, lenses, and tripod and real food for lunch (flatbread and tuna FTW!).

Started out fine. Beautiful morning, if a touch warm and humid. We took the STAIRS this time!  :D

When we were pulled off to the side just before a little bridge, a couple passed with a large dog who started threat-barking at Doz and Tali.  We decided to give them a little room to get ahead, but as we were almost over the bridge, Dozer (since he was focusing on the dog ahead and not where he was going) jogged sideways at the wrong moment and his wonky back legs slipped and went over the edge while he was still hanging onto the bridge with his front feet. Fortunately it was only about a 2-foot drop, and once we wrestled him back to the level ground he let out these fierce guard-dog barks as if to say "I meant to do that!".  Did make us a lot more cautious/paranoid for the rest of the hike anywhere near edges or uncertain footing though!

The morning sun was starting to stream down in divided beams around the trees and rocks, and it hit the misting in the valley and made for some truly striking light

We got to a point in the trail maybe a quarter-mile along that had a semi-recent feeling rockfall that blocked the trail up pretty badly and made it too precarious to trust with the dogs.  We were thinking we would have to retrace to the trailhead and drive to Old Man and start from there, but the stream was very shallow and narrow at this point and we found a couple places where stepping stones had been laid out.  There was a path on the other side, so we decided to try to cross, take that path, and see if we could get around the obstruction then cross back.  Crossed without too much issue though Doozle temporarily decided he was now afraid of water and hung back for a minute, and my clumsies mean I now have one wet shoe.  Kicking myself for wearing trail-running shoes instead of breaking down and getting real waterproof hiking boots at this point for sure!  Next investment...

We made our way along the trail-ish on the other side of the stream, and started hearing rushing water noises on our left (further away from the main trail).  We detoured down a little side cove in the cliffs and found a beautiful little falls surrounded by mossy green rocks.  We spent a lot of time there with Brian taking pictures.  Still not sure what falls this was- it was enough of a feature to deserve a name, but we couldn't find it on the maps anywhere.  So we decided to name it Salamander Falls since I spotted a teeny little salamander among the rocks while Brian was setting up. Or we can call it Limoco Falls if you ask Brian.  :P

 

After coming back to the stream bank, we continued along for a little way then found another stepping stone set to cross back and continue along the main trail.

We kept going, taking frequent breaks to rest and water the dogs (and for Brian to take pictures of other little falls we came across.  There were several places where the trail got pretty treacherous for the dogs and we had to be really careful with Dozer in particular.  There were a couple of root-steps that Brian actually had to lift Dozer down or up.  Tali was trotting along all graceful like this was all in a day's work- she was such a good girl!

Finally we came to the Lower Falls at the base of the Old Man's Cave section of trail.  By this point, we were getting a little lower than we liked in water and needed restrooms and food, so we decided to trek straight up to the trailhead (turned out to be another 10-15 minutes and a LOT of steps) and save for picture taking on the way back down.  Once we got all the way up to the parking lot, the sun was brutal and there was a vast temperature difference, so the dogs almost immediately went flat.  There was a big visitor center under construction there, so the only bathrooms were portlets again (OK, we can cope) and the water fountain at the picnic shelter was turned off (big-time worrisome news). I sat with the dogs in the shade of the shelter and fed them the remaining water while Brian hiked toward the mouth of the parking lot to see if there was a store or camping facilities or any other places where we could refill.  After what felt like forever, he came back with a big jug of water from a camping store about 1/3 mile away.  Saved the day!!!  We ate our lunches, watered ourselves and the dogs, and managed to fill all our water bladders and bottles back up full.  Felt much better by this time and the dogs had had a good rest and were ready to move again.

It had taken us about 3 hours to cover the 3-plus miles of the trail (was supposed to be 2 miles according to maps/signs) to get to that halfway point.  Including waterfall photo setups of course.  ;) So we decided instead of detouring to the Upper Falls and Devil's Bathtub since we didn't know how far that was going to be we would hit and photograph the main cave and the lower falls area, then head back.

Old Man's Cave:

 

and surrounding falls and cliffs:

  

 

 

Lower Falls:

Fortunately the hike back did go faster- less picking our way was needed and less photography stops since we had covered most things on the way in.  We did take breaks every 1/2 mile or sooner to rest and water the dogs.

 

And we made it back to the Cedar trailhead with a good margin before the sun was going to start going down.

Dozer was still pulling, even at the very end, so I think they had a great time!  Lots of smells to smell and stranger-pets- we actually met a bunch of former or current Berner-people on the trail and a couple of the folks gave such good ear and back-scratches that Dozer was all set to go home with them!  All in all, a very successful day.  Back to the lovely, air-conditioned cabin with soft couches and bed and a real-food dinner! After a good turn through the hose-bib to get rid of all the muck and sand that the kids had clinging to tummies and leg feathers of course.  And they both slept like logs that night!!