The Interface at Texas Falls:
Safety in Wildness

By Alice Lee

The interface between man and nature characterizes many nationally and state-owned lands. Texas Falls exemplifies this division and connection: we are attracted to the raging, self-defined torrent pouring over jagged falls, yet we only visit because we feel secure as a result of the National Forest's caretakers attempts at safeguarding the area. Conveniently located a few miles west of the junction between Routes 100 and 125 lies a waterfall that is the epitome of nature's power, for glacial movements and the power of rushing water have thoroughly sculpted the course of the river here, making the area into what it is today. Simultaneously, government officials have sculpted their own path, lining the trail with words of warnings and barricades of protection. Both nature's will and man's logic have participated in designing this area: it is the story of an interface. Man, seduced by Texas Falls' glory, has adapted the area into one which can support visitors who want a view of the wild but need the assurance of bridges and barriers. In this way, guests at the falls experience a modified space, but do not care--or perhaps even notice--because they can relax and feel comfortable, at ease because they won't fall in.

Just after Route 125 finishes its descent from the peak of Middlebury College's Snow Bowl, a small painted brown sign beckons the driver off the road and down half a mile to the turnoff for the falls. The dirt road has been nicely plowed in the winter, for there are some houses along this beautiful lane. However, the main attraction on this road is clearly Texas Falls, because approaching the area the speed limit is fifteen miles per hour--whereas while driving back to Route 100, the speed limit is thirty-five. Everyone comes for the rushing river. The place to park your car--a tiny, scooped-out clearing such as they create for scenic views along rural highways--is not plowed in the winter; however, the snowbanks are just a little lower, so stopping your car there is best if you have four wheel drive or a reliable vehicle. In the summer, though, there is space enough for half a dozen cars.

The reason that the space is not plowed is that the National Forest, like any other government or organization, does not want to get sued for hazardous conditions. The bulletin board across the street from this unplowed turnoff reiterates the Forest managers' desire to keep the falls closed in winter. The board has signs declaring that dogs should be leashed, and that there is NO SWIMMING. Another posting insists that Texas Falls is closed between ten at night and six in the morning. The theme of KEEP OUT continues down the path, over the bridge and up onto the mile-long nature trail. If I glance right as I stand by the bulletin board and look down the hill to the bridge crossing the river, there are two signs warning that the steps are icy in winter: KEEP OFF. One is wooden and, is clearly hung every year in early December after the snow begins to fall. The threats about danger from fearful government officials avoiding accusations from litigious visitors are clearly ignored, however; there are always people traipsing about the site, leaving flattened snow-boot marks which blend together into an icy skin atop the once needle-covered path.

Texas Falls is a beautiful area with all its dramatic icicles, roiling waters and snow-laden conifers. When I first visited in early January, the snow was a foot high, flirting with the tops of my boots and making the few feet down the path a trudging journey. On my second pilgrimage, I parked my car next to a Jeep Cherokee and stepped out to find the trail groomed by the many visitors, and across the stream a man was packing his camera and tripod into a long black case. I stood watching, knowing that he was done and would soon be gone; I did not want to navigate myself across until he was safely in his car. He passed me, acknowledging that I was busily scribbling in my notebook and trying to emphasize our connection, "Beautiful here, isn't it?" he asked somewhat rhetorically. I watched his retreating figure, wishing just a little that he would stay as my lifeguard before I plummeted down the trail.

The National Forest Service has built a fence to avoid having to post lifeguards. The fence follows the edge of the path down to the bridge that crosses the river; the supports for this triple-railed fence are made of rocks arranged in the style of a fieldstone fireplace. Upright rectangles finished with triangular tops, these supports are placed about five feet apart from one another, and the diagonally cut beams running between each are cemented into the posts. The fence serves as an effective way to guide one down the steps in an upright position. It is the construct of foresters who want--and need--visitors to feel and be safe. The fence illustrates the stunning contradiction between man's attraction to the falls and his need for safety, because every possible fatal route down to the river is shielded by a section of fencing. Even though this persistent obstruction takes a bit away from the wildness of Texas Falls, it has been so beautifully built that its grace fits in well with the constructs of the pulsing water. The masonry of the fence posts highlights the masonry of the riverbank's ledge.

Contrasting this fence of protection are the unshoveled steps; they are more hazardous than would be a slippery slope down a hill. I use the railing as a crutch, leading me down to the bridge. It is clear from the graffiti on the boards hung across the bridge that people of all ages love to visit Texas Falls. These wooden boards have been painted brown and prevent visitors from falling into the violent stream, for which I am quite thankful. Having visited this site in warmer weather, I know that people come from all over to watch the fierce waters rage along glacier-cut walls before swirling into crevices along the river's edge. The inscriptions of love carved by ML+JD 4EVER, the marks showing that CC visited in '89--these and other griffiti across the bridge's boards remind the visitor what a mystical place Texas Falls is. Undoubt-edly, there is a sense of romance, a feeling that some great painter could stand on that very bridge and attempt to recreate the brewing waters beneath it.

And it is mystical for the reasons that many of us visit nationally and state-owned properties. It allows an exploration of the interface between man and nature, yet it is also, within each nook and cranny, an example of water's power in shaping landscape. It was man--in the form of government employees--who built the fences and bridge, who erected the bulletin board at the top of the trail, who cut and groomed the trails leading away from Texas Falls. However, we do not come here to see man's creations; we come to examine how glacial movements and the force of water running down the falls for untold years have sculpted the rock into the grooves and curves which characterize the site today. Anyone who visits the area is undoubtedly struck by the place where rock has been carved into glacial potholes; it is these formations which bring the tourist east of the Middlebury Gap and down into Hancock's portion of the White River.

The connection between man's relationship to Texas Falls and nature's construction of the site is not a large leap. While the gorge is not wide, the narrow falls are dramatic enough to have hollowed out numerous deep pools. The smooth lines on the cliffs running down into the water could never have been created by dynamite or drilling, but are refreshing reminders of the natural wonders which surround us everywhere. Looking away from the falls and left just beneath the bridge, I cannot help but marvel at the perfectly round basin carved into the rock. Ice crusts the edge of this still pool, yet the water is simultaneously alive and stagnant closer to the tumbling stream in the middle.

Doubtless, the ice by the Falls is one positive attribute of winter visits. Beside the Falls, the rock continues horizontally across the breadth of the river. Raised a bit higher than the gorge's flow, it is easy to imagine that this precipice used to be part of the waterfall, but that then the stream carved out its own direction--in the same way that the state placed its bridge in the exact place that it did. In any case, this continuing ridge across the waterfall is laden with dreamy icicles like those at which I love to gaze on the ledges beside highways. Sharp daggers of frigid ice connected together like points on a crown, each one amounts to the extension of an original drip of water. These spiked icicles are dirtied by the muddy land at the peak of the cliff, but below, springing directly out of the ledge, smooth wrinkles of vibrant blue cover the rock face.

Just beneath the falls, another interesting geological phenomenon has dented the wall of a cliff. Perfectly oval, a cavern curves into the face of the rock. While it is not a cave into which any animal could climb and rest, it is indented enough to collect a layer of ice unlike that on the flat cliffs or the daggers extending off a lip of rock. Instead, the crater flaunts the look of a honey-dipped doughnut, a smooth and shiny sugar coat with little licks of roughness. Protected from the elements, the icing drools down and through the hollow--like frosting from the roof of a gingerbread house--and does not consume the whole space.

The bridge across the river leads to a trail running a little more than a mile through the forest. While in winter the rushing surge of the waterfall is not as loud as it is, in other seasons it is nice to listen to the diminishing sounds of the gorge as you wind your way further and further into the woods. Whether you turn right or left to walk the nature circuit, you soon cross a small footbridge where the water gurgles peacefully--unlike the torrent of the waterfall beneath. In winter the rustlings of squirrels and other small animals can't be heard on the crust of snow, for the brittle leaves and undergrowth of spring, summer and fall do not camouflage their movements the way snow absorbs scurrying feet. And though there are tiny footprints and chirps from lonesome birds, there is more stillness, more solitude during the winter. Standing on the bridge overlooking the tumbling stream, there is no competition for attention from other visitors whether human or animal. Instead, there only remain the markings of the interface between man and nature--the markings on the bridge, the stale footprints of other people visiting the trail, the beautiful fence bordering the water's edge.

Texas Falls is a perfect place to stop on the trip to Boston, and an ideal place to spend an afternoon during any season. The constructs of man mirror the remarkable constructs of the rushing water: while fencing keeps tourists from falling into the river, the glacial molds and the pulsing stream's dented rocks continue to make the waterway wider, to make the flow occupy more and more space. Texas Falls' signs, bridges, barriers and fences remind the visitor that, even working behind the façade of conservation, man has marked the space in a variety of ways. By protecting Texas Falls, the National Forest Service pledges not to extend our buildings and our dirtied footprints onto this site; nonetheless we did feel compelled to adapt the area into something appealing to all visitors who value life above water. We establish the requirements for basic human safety in this wildness; we have warned all the people who visit that they won't and shouldn't make a pure and true contact with that untamed wildness to which they are drawn. Texas Falls, and many other nationally and state owned lands, are thus examples of the contradictions we create to feel connected to nature. Inherently drawn to tumbling and brutal waters, we make fences so that we can feel safe. Meanwhile, ignoring man's nervous constructs, the river tries to make its space bigger and bigger, century after century.

How to get there: South of Middlebury on U.S., turn left onto route 125 and follow it up to Bread Loaf, past the Snow Bowl and about halfway down the mountain toward Hancock, where the road dead-ends into route 100. Lefthand turn to Texas Falls is well marked with National Forest signs.

A brown-painted sign welcomes visitors to Texas Falls, but it is the beginning of a series of warnings about the limitations of the "Observation Site"

Looking away from the Falls, the bridge overlooks a symphony of moving waters, snow-covered rocks, icy ledges and criss-crossing tree debris

The Falls tumble beneath a layer of snow-covered ice. To the right, brown-tinted ice juts jaggedly down to meet the water's surface

Directly beneath the bridge, a fallen branch pokes through the center of a circular pool