If you’ve ever fallen beneath the bridge near Gerudo Valley’s entrance in Ocarina of Time, you might know that the water leads straight to Lake Hylia. It’s a cute shortcut that connects two different parts of Hyrule in a unique way.
As it turns out, it’s hardly the only place you’ll see this particular river. In fact, the river leading from Gerudo Valley to Lake Hylia happens to be the same river that makes up the moat outside of Hyrule Castle Town. It also happens to lead into Zora’s River, going all the way up to Zora’s Fountain, the source of all the water in Hyrule. By looking at some data left in the game, we can see that this very river may have hidden one other secret shortcut, but seems to have unfortunately been cut from the game.
After climbing to the top of Zora’s Domain and sliding past the Zora King, you’ll reach Zora’s Fountain — source of all the rivers and water in Hyrule — with a waterfall leading out of it, blocked off by wooden poles. Based on the map of Hyrule from the game, the waterfall blocked off by wooden poles in Zora’s Fountain and the waterfall in Zora’s River appear to be the same one, implying that the blocked off waterfall may have been a shortcut to Zora’s River from Zora’s Fountain.
It’s hard to theorize as to why this shortcut was removed from the final game, since we don’t have any developer’s opinion to go off of. It’s possible that the shortcut itself was seen as redundant, since the two maps that it would connect (Zora’s River and Zora’s Fountain) are relatively close.
My personal theory is that having the waterfall be accessible via Zora’s Fountain might’ve prompted players to see where the waterfall lead, only to realize they had unintentionally backtracked and would then have to climb all the way back up to Zora’s Fountain.
In my opinion, it’s a shame that this shortcut never saw the light of day. Bringing a final connection to the river that runs throughout Hyrule would’ve made for a nice touch.
