Little Falls, Potomac River, Washington DC

Washington DC is one of the many cities in the US Mid-Atlantic region located on the “fall line” where the hard crystalline bedrock of the Piedmont meets the relatively soft sediments of the Coastal Plain. The region contains several major rivers that are as a rule wide, navigable and tidal up to the fall line. At that point they usually contain a steep fast stretch as they transition to their generally narrower, shallower, fresher Piedmont forms.

Some of these “falls” are more impressive than others. Now that I’m listing them out, they appear to get more dramatic as you go south. A casual tuber could go over the falls on the Delaware at Trenton without spilling his or her drink (though to be fair I’ve only seen them briefly out a train window). The dam on the Schuylkill by the Philadelphia water works is a nice urban park, but it is overshadowed by the city's Museum of Art nearby (from Rocky). Jones Falls in Baltimore features some dramatic scenes of post-industrial nature but the stream is relatively small.  The Great Falls of the Potomac is a famous tourist attraction: a tall, rocky waterfall on a major river, with a rugged gorge full of white water below the falls, and cascading, swimmable side-streams. At the overlooks, one encounters international tourists on a side trip from their visits to the nation’s capital. Whatever they have in Richmond I’ve never gotten a good look at.

To return to the Potomac, Great Falls overshadows its also beautiful downstream counterpart Little Falls. Little Falls is more of a cataract or a rapids, as the drop is only about 10 feet over a few hundred feet of stream bed, but the angry churning white water forced through a narrow channel, the cliffs on the Virginia side, and the surprisingly wild setting make it well worth the visit. Its location on the DC city limits, just five miles from the Lincoln Memorial, qualifies it as urban nature, in a surprisingly rugged example. Great Falls on the other hand is outside the beltway and requires a drive through obnoxiously fancy suburbs.

Perhaps it’s easy to access the river near Little Falls in low water, but in late December, a few days after a heavy rain, getting to the water’s edge was surprisingly adventurous. A paved path leading from the C&O Canal trail (did I mention most of these rivers have canals along them?) was covered in feet of icy water. Instead we had to climb through brambles and over rocks in a riparian wilderness till we reached the slippery ice near the falls. Herons and hawks flew above. Mansions looked down disapprovingly on us from the top of the cliffs on the Virginia side. The water roared. A bridge a short distance downstream would probably have provided us a nice view at a small fraction of the effort, but the unexpected challenge was part of the fun.