Wallace Falls

Last weekend the weather was gorgeous, so we took advantage of the moment and decided to go on a hike. I found the Wallace Falls hike online more-so through a process of elimination, since we have hiked most of the kid-friendly waterfall hikes in the area. But now I wish that we had discovered the Wallace Falls State Park earlier! It is well maintained and the trail to Wallace Falls affords a variety of different views.

The beginning of the hike is placed in a wide area that has been cleared out for power lines. There are some lovely views of the Cascades here: Mount Persis is in the far right (elevation 5452 ft.), Mount Index is the next peak to the left (5979 ft.), and the smaller peak above Sam's head is Philadelphia Mountain (4257 ft.). The smallest peak in the far distance on the right is Mt. Baring (which is actually the largest peak in this view, at 6125 ft.).

This was an unusual hike for our family, because we didn't complete all of it together. The parking lot was full by the trailhead, so J had to drop the rest of off and find a parking spot about 3/4 of a mile away. I started down the trail with the kids (see first photo), and J hurried to catch up with us about 15-20 minutes later. Then, when we were about half a mile from the Lower Falls viewpoint, J and Sam decided to stop (J's leg was bothering him from going running the day before). Lucy and I continued on, but Lucy ended up falling asleep in the backpack a few minutes before we got to the waterfall. I was the last one standing by the time the waterfall was in sight!

We walked a little ways along the Small Falls turnoff: it is a short loop trail off of the main trail to Wallace Falls.

At the Lower Falls of Wallace Falls! You can see the greater waterfall cascading down in the distance on the right, too. A good view of both the Lower and Upper Falls can be seen HERE.

This is the rock that J and Sam sat on while they waited for me and Lucy to finish our trek up to the falls. J said that Sam wanted to just chat about Minecraft, but J kept creatively steering the discussion so that they could also talk about the beautiful surroundings in the forest.

I hope we can go back to this trail another time, not only so J and Sam can see the falls in person, but also so we can hike further. I turned around at the Lower Falls (which was two miles from the trailhead), but one day I would like to go farther to Middle Falls (about 2.3 miles from the trailhead) and the Upper Falls (about 2.8 miles from the trailhead). One day, when the kids are older and can handle hiking or biking longer distances, it would be fun to go to Wallace Lake at the park, too.