Muddy Creek Falls (Swallow Falls State Park - Oakland, MD)

This is a classic good news bad news moment I guess. The bad news? I have not been updating or posting anywhere near as regular as I would like. The good news? The reason is I have been so incredibly busy getting out and taking so many pictures and video that I have not had much time to post! So here's an update. These pictures were taken recently at Muddy Creek Falls. This is located within Swallow Falls State Park very close to Oakland, Maryland along the Youghiogheny River Valley. I had not been to this location in close to 30 years. All I can say is wow. This is probably the most scenic location in the entire State of Maryland. As a result it is also pretty popular with tourists. As you can see there are none in these pictures. That's because we got an early 0800 start before they all came out. What a peaceful and beautiful experience this was. Walking through the woods to get here the fog was beginning to lift and buzzards were circling overhead. Quite an interesting sight. This was the first part of our day. I have more to share in later posts from different areas of Swallow Falls State Park. And actually the sun broke through about an hour after these were taken and it became a perfect (and very warm) Autumn day. Oh and in case you are wondering 53 feet.... that's how tall the falls are. There are tons of Hemlock trees in this area due to the brutal winter climate. Many of these trees are huge and probably 250-300 years old. Amazing to see and experience. The water levels shown here are very low. The entire mid-Atlantic has had a pretty good run of very mild but very dry weather. Even still this place is just phenomenal to experience. If you are ever in the western most part of Maryland, northern West Virginia, even the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area - it is worth the time and effort to get to this place. My goal is to make a winter time visit when things are iced up. We shall see. Thanks as always for reading and I hope you enjoy these photos. I did post some video on my YouTube channel. Take care!