South Carolina Wildlife Magazine

Article for January - February 2008

Photographer Notebook
Phillip Jones at Cliff Falls

Cliff Falls
The shot of me on page of the January-February 2008 issue was taken by videographer Glenn Gardner back in 1996 when we, along with DNR news writer Greg Lucas and then-chief videographer John Lucas, were shooting a magazine assignment on the trail between Jones Gap and Caesars Head. At this small waterfall, called Cliff Falls, I was going to shoot a picture of Glenn under the falls but I had to back up some to get it. When I backed up, I was standing on a board bridge over the small creek. The board broke when I moved, and I fell, with all my equipment, into the water and began slipping toward the edge of the cliff. I thought, “Well, this is it,” but then I felt someone grab the toe of my boot. John had grabbed onto a tree limb to secure himself, then grabbed me, stopping me right before I slipped over. I lost my equipment over the cliff, including my nice FM2 camera, and I had to hike the rest of the day in wet clothes. Greg recalls that the motor drive of the camera fired off shot after shot and shot as the camera bounded down the cliff.

Cliff Falls is near Caesars Head State Park headquarters, in Greenville County, and it’s at the junction of Rim of the Gap Trail (for more information, see South Carolina Wildlife magazine’s Field Trip to Rim of the Gap Trail in the Sept.-Oct. 1996 issue) and the Naturaland Trust Trail. Both of these trails are in the Mountain Bridge Wilderness and Recreation Area.

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