At 18 feet, it’s not a particularly high waterfall, but very pretty with three distinct streams flowing over the rock face. As we approached the waterfall, we realized that we would have to rock hop across Falling Branch to get a good view of the waterfall. Not expecting a challenging hike, neither of us had worn hiking boots or brought trekking poles. But we found a couple of sticks on the ground to act as poles and made it across and headed up to near the base of the waterfall. It was a chilly morning and there was ice around the waterfall, making the waterfall that much more scenic.
It’s my understanding that this is a popular waterfall and swimming hole in the warmer months, but early on a November morning, we had the place to ourselves. We didn’t linger long, however, as we had to get up to Pennsylvania. We drove for a little over an hour through Lancaster to the Wolf Sanctuary of PA. Sandy’s mom had suggested we visit while we were in the area. We arrived right at 12, purchased our tickets, and started the tour. There were a lot of people here and our tour group was fairly large, but our tour guide, Denny, did a great job and the tours still felt personal. For about 2 hours, Denny took us around to meet the different packs.
The first pack we visited was Merlin’s pack, including him, Keisha, and his son Tioga. Merlin was the alpha, but he wasn't interested in food or visitors today. Tioga, was very interested in food, however. If Merlin had been interested, Tioga would have had to wait for his treats. At one point, Tioga peed in his enclosure. Almost immediately, Merlin jumped up, ran across the enclosure, peed over Tioga’s spot, then ran back and went back to sleep! It was amazing how he showed his dominance.
Later, we visited the large pack with about a dozen wolves, some who were hungry and excited for treats, others who didn’t bother getting up.
Sandy’s favorite wolf was Winston, an older wolf who lived in this pack. Denny said he had to specially give Winston his food as the others sometimes bullied him.
At one point on the tour, Denny made howling sounds. Soon, one wolf joined in howling, then a couple more, and pretty soon, just about all the wolves were howling! It was a beautiful sound.
We had a really good time on this tour and it was great to see how these people were taking care of these beautiful animals.
Our tour finished up a little after 2 and we started heading back to Maryland. But before we headed back to her relatives’ house, we stopped back at Rocks State Park and went to the Rock Ridge Picnic Area. It was getting late and we didn’t have a lot of time, so we quickly hiked the short red trail to King and Queen Seat.
This huge rock outcrop above Deer Creek provided great views in the waning daylight. It’s believed to have once been a ceremonial meeting place for the Susquehannock people. We climbed around on the rocks for a bit and got some pictures of the lovely views over the Deer Creek valley and then headed back to the in-laws.
We had dinner with her family again and then started getting our stuff packed up in preparation to head to Pennsylvania.
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