The falls can be reached from Jamaica State park ($3 fee. Parking is located at 43 D 06.562 72 D 46.500. The total walk will be about 6 miles.
From the parking area, go up the West River trail that follows an old RR bed and offers some spectacular views of the river. The West River Railroad operated from about 1879 until 1927, when a flood wiped most of it out. Now it is a nice flat trail. About ½ mile up the trail there are large glacial erratics in the river
. About two miles up the Wells River trail you take a right onto the Hamilton Falls trail which was once an old wagon road and continue up the steep pine-Hemlock forested stream valley for almost a mile. Then a steep footpath leads down to the falls.
After slowly flowing through fairly level terrain, Cobb Brook drops in a spectacular display over the steep sloping ledge of Hoosic Schist and Cavendish Schist. Cobb Brook, after slowly flowing through fairly level terrain, drops in a spectacular display. After dropping down a 15' slide into a pothole, the stream slides down a long and steep sloping ledge of schist, slice its way sideways through deeply cut gorge walls formed from thousands of years of erosion
The schists form a group of medium-grade metamorphic rocks, chiefly notable for the preponderance of lamellar minerals such as micas, chlorite, talc, hornblende, graphite, and others . By definition, schist contains more than 50% platy and elongated minerals, often finely interleaved with quartz and feldspar. The individual mineral grains in schist, drawn out into flaky scales by heat and pressure, can be seen by the naked eye. Schist is characteristically foliate, meaning the individual mineral grains split off easily into flakes or slabs. The word schist is derived from the Greek word meaning "to split", which is a reference to the ease with which schists can be split along the plane in which the platy minerals lie. Most schists have been derived from clays and muds which have passed through a series of metamorphic processes involving the production of shales, slates, and phyllites as intermediate steps
You can return to the trail and follow it to the top of the falls (less than 0.2 miles) , bear left at the road and then left again just past the small sawmill. At the top you will see the start of the falls as Cobb Brook desends down a 15' slide into a large pothole. Swimming is not permitted. Despite the warnings of falling to one's death, this is a moderately popular swimming hole. You can see a ladder in place, to exit the pothole.
To log this Earth Cache you must:
A. Post a picture of you with the falls in the background.
B. Answer the following questions:
1) Estimate the total height of the falls? Rough guess is fine.
2) How many distinct pools are there at base of the falls?
3) What type of waterfall is this? (Multiple answers are ok)
What is a Waterfall? A waterfall is usually a geological formation resulting from water, often in the form of a stream, flowing over an erosion-resistant rock formation that forms a sudden break in elevation. Some waterfalls form in mountain environments where the erosive water force is high and stream courses may be subject to sudden and catastrophic change. In such cases, the waterfall may not be the end product of many years of water action over a region, but rather the result of relatively sudden geological processes such as landslides, faults or volcanic action.
Typically, a river flows over a large step in the rocks which may have been formed by a fault line. Over a period of years, the edges of this shelf will gradually break away and the waterfall will steadily retreat upstream, creating a gorge of recession. Often, the rock stratum just below the more resistant shelf will be of a softer type, meaning undercutting, due to splashback, will occur here to form a shallow cave-like formation known as a rock shelter or plunge pool under and behind the waterfall. Eventually, the outcropping, more resistant cap rock will collapse under pressure to add blocks of rock to the base of the waterfall. These blocks of rock are then broken down into smaller boulders by attrition as they collide with each other, and they also erode the base of the waterfall by abrasion, creating a deep plunge pool.
Streams become wider and more shallow just above waterfalls due to flowing over the rock shelf, and there is usually a deep pool just below the waterfall because of the kinetic energy of the water hitting the bottom. Waterfalls can occur along the edge of glacial trough, whereby a stream or river flowing into a glacier continues to flow into a valley after the glacier has receded or melted. The large waterfalls in Yosemite Valley are examples of this phenomenon. The rivers are flowing from hanging valleys.
Types of Waterfalls
Block: Water descends from a relatively wide stream or river.
Cascade: Water descends a series of rock steps.
Cataract: A large waterfall.
Fan: Water spreads horizontally as it descends while remaining in contact with bedrock.
Horsetail: Descending water maintains some contact with bedrock.
Plunge: Water descends vertically, losing contact with the bedrock surface.
Punchbowl: Water descends in a constricted form, then spreads out in a wider pool.
Segmented: Distinctly separate flows of water form as it descends.
Tiered: Water drops in a series of distinct steps or falls.
Multi-Step: A series of waterfalls one after another of roughly the same size each with its own sunken plunge pool.
Reference: From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia