We warned you at the beginning of the week that this year’s record-size Sierra snowpack melt could cause overflow and flooding near Merced River in Yosemite National Park, and that fishers, swimmers, and campers should exercise caution. Those schoolmarm-y admonitions still remain in effect, but what we did not anticipate was a flood of a different kind — a flood of amateur-shot waterfall videos from Yosemite Falls and Bridalveil Falls being uploaded to Twitter and Instagram. Sure, rising water levels can pose risks to outlying communities and may affect Bay Area sea levels later in the year. But we still think it is therapeutically appropriate to kill some time on a Friday afternoon spacing out to the fabulous treasury of crowdsourced Yosemite waterfall videos embedded below.
Yosemite Falls today: you know it's cranking if it's a J-shape. Water is HIGH & valley is filled w/reflections. STUNNING!
— Samantha Biobabbler (@biobabbler) May 4, 2017
😅😍🤓😎 pic.twitter.com/5T85JDISFY
You’ll have to forgive some of these amateur smartphone videographers for shooting in the dreaded Portrait mode. Because in certain cases, the height of the mountains and the beauty of the lakes below really do kind of call for vertical orientation.
Even though it is the Trump administration, the U.S. Department of the Interior is apparently still allowed to tweet. They tweeted this amazing waterfall rainbow video on Wednesday, though we’ve embedded the above ABC News version of the same video that tastes the rainbow for a few seconds longer.
Yosemite falls off the charts this year pic.twitter.com/am5mnIYbcT
— Bill Martin (@BillMartinKTVU) May 2, 2017
According to KGO-TV, this year’s melting snowpack is as large as the last four years’ combined. They note that some campgrounds adjacent to the Merced River have been closed because of the flood risk.
This particular Insta user is somewhat incorrect with her claim that Yosemite Falls is the “highest waterfall in the US”, but her sophisticated use of a multi-screen animation format to present these spectacular waterfalls definitely merits the inclusion of her work in this waterfall treasury blog post.
@Daddypantz1220 incredible hike! Tough one! Worth it. #yosemitefalls pic.twitter.com/B9f8BBz5V1
— Joni Edelman (@joniboloney) April 24, 2017
KRON 4 has some additional Yosemite waterfall videos, but most are preceded by a crappy KRON 4 News at 10 advertisement that is longer than the videos themselves. For a really good, long, mesmerizing trip-out, the Yosemite Conservancy has a Yosemite Falls webcam that captures the action nonstop.
Related: Major Winter Rain And Snow Make For Pretty Waterfalls In Yosemite National Park