Almost Paradise

Photo courtesy Richard Voisin

In the valley where I raised my son, there's a waterfall just a few minutes walk away - up the road, on to a forest trail, a short hike up a boulder-strewn stream... and there it is. It's a little waterfall; everything here is island-scale. It cascades over a rim of rock into a pool of cold, fresh water. This waterfall and the area around it is my son's favorite place on earth.


Photo courtesy Richard Voisin

High above the first waterfall, further into the forest, th...