olympic peninsula waterfall trail Archives • Weekend Walkabout

Strawberry Bay Falls at Third Beach Near La Push

July 21, 2014 by Don Wilson

Strawberry Bay Falls was on the agenda for the day. After having to stop in Sequim for some supplies, then spending some time in Forks, WA to see the “Twilight” scenes, we were running a little late.

We had originally intended to travel all the way around to Lake Quinault and visit about 4 waterfalls near there. That part of the trip would have to be held off for another time.

We found the Third Beach trailhead by following our GPS instructions which took us from Highway 101 and onto Highway 110 at Forks, WA. We arrived at the trailhead about 2 miles before La Push. Come to think about it, we never actually ventured on into La Push on this trip. Oh well, something else for another day.

The hike from the trailhead to the beach is about 1 1/4 miles. It was obvious to me that Leslie was wishing she had brought her jacket. I was wearing a t-shirt and shorts and felt very comfortable.

We made sure that dad and mom didn’t feel like they had to complete every trek that Leslie and I were on, but they were determined to reach the destination.

The scenery along the trail was mostly very green – we were in a rainforest, after all.

Most of the trail was pretty smooth and level, but shortly before we came to the ocean, we began to descent down toward the beach and the trail got a little rugged with rocks and protruding roots.

We enjoyed a short walk of about 1/2 mile along a smooth, sandy beach. The weather was very pleasant. A friend of ours who was at First Beach the day after we were here said it was raining so hard, they didn’t get out of the car. I guess we were lucky.

The waterfall, itself, is rather unimpressive, however, it is unique and interesting as it drops off a cliff and into the ocean. It’s the first ocean falls that I’ve been to. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a waterfall that drops into any significant body of water.

I think what made this waterfall visit the most interesting was the diversity of landscape through the short hike to the waterfall. I really enjoyed the hike through a rainforest, descending down onto an ocean beach. Who doesn’t like a walk along the beach on a calm day?

Marymere Falls Near Crescent Lake

July 18, 2014 by Don Wilson

The last waterfall we visited while on our trip to Discovery Bay was Marymere Falls. It’s located in Clallum County in the north central part of the peninsula just to the south of Crescent Lake and about 20 miles west of Port Angeles. The trail head is next to the Storm King Ranger Station.

The trail is a round trip of about one and a half miles. It begins by taking you through a large culvert-like tunnel under the highway, then winds through a clean and well maintained path through the rainforest. the scenery is exotic and vivid green. I’ve heard that some describe it as like being in a Lord of the Rings setting. That might be an accurate description.

The first part of the hike is fairly flat and level. Along the way, you’ll notice an abundance of ferns and some rather large trees. You’ll come to two rustic bridges. The first crosses Barnes Creek, and the second is immediately following the first and it takes you across Falls Creek. Immediately following the the second bridge, you’ll start climbing stairs and ascending up about 200 feet to a moss covered ravine.

Along the way, the trail splits into a loop that will take you to two different view points for the waterfall. If you take the left fork, you will first enjoy the lower view point which is directly across from the base of the falls and looking up to the top. The upper view point provides you with a vantage point that is near the center-top of the 100 plus foot waterfall.

My mom and dad, who are in their late 70’s/early 80’s were traveling with us and were able to make the hike all the way to the lower viewing area. They elected not to continue the climb to the upper viewing area. Because the last part of the hike was mostly uphill with lots of stairs, I wasn’t sure that they would continue all the way in to where they could see the falls, but they were troopers – very tired troopers, but they made it.

I can’t begin to describe the feelings and enjoyment that I get from experiencing the beauty of the outdoors that God created for us. All I can say is that the experience is well worth the short distance to travel and the easy walk to these falls.

Rocky Brook Falls on the Olympic Peninsula

July 15, 2014July 16, 2014 by Don Wilson

After leaving Vincent Falls, we continued north on Highway 101 for about another 30 miles to Dosewallips Road, where we left the highway to find Rocky Brook Falls.

Before we turned off to visit Rocky Brook Falls, we made a failed attempt to locate Hamma Hamma Falls using roadsigns and our best guess, since we hadn’t acquired clear directions before the trip, and our GPS didn’t seem to know anything about the waterfall. I guess that was all right, because we really didn’t have enough time to visit more than two of the four waterfalls that we were knew of along this stretch of 101, so as soon as we realized we weren’t going to easily find Hamma Hamma Falls, we moved on.

Unlike Hamma Hamma Falls, our GPS was well aware of Rocky Brook Falls and we were able to drive directly to the trail head. I should mention that the Olympic Peninsula Waterfall Trail website gives clear directions for finding this waterfall, as well as all the others that we were interested in visiting. We just hadn’t spent enough time planning for our adventure as we should have.

For as nice a waterfall as Rocky Brook Falls is, there were surprisingly few visitors. When we arrived at the trailhead, we found that it was just a wide spot in the road with room for about a dozen cars to pull off and park. It was only about half full, so we knew that we wouldn’t encounter hoards of other people at this one.

It was a short, easy walk along a well groomed trail to get to the falls. We especially hoped to find waterfalls like this that were easily accessible for my parents who were with us on this trip. They get around pretty well, but long and rugged trails would definitely hold them back.

Signage along the way warns that water levels can change rapidly, so visitors should be aware of sudden stream flow changes. One old roughly made and obscure sign didn’t leave me with a seriously threatened feeling. I have to believe that if there were serious danger, the point would have been made much more boldly. We watched out, nonetheless.

There weren’t many people at the falls while we were there, but the few that were there were sure a disruptive bunch. Some were swimming and they had strewn out towels, backpacks, and clothing over the rocks at the base of the falls. For those of us who were there to get some photographs of the falls, it sure made things challenging. We had to maneuver ourselves to places where the people and all the junk were outside of the picture frame. We managed a few decent shots.

It’s estimated that this waterfall is about 150 feet tall. I wouldn’t call it “spectacular”, but very nice. It is a nice retreat for a hot summer day. Because it is so easy to get to, I can’t think of a reason to skip it if you have a little time and plan to be in the area.

Vincent Creek Falls and the High Steel Bridge

July 14, 2014July 16, 2014 by Don Wilson

While traveling to Discovery Bay with my Parents, we decided to check on a couple waterfalls that were along the way. There were four of them between Shelton and Port Townsend that we had identified and we had hoped to visit at least 2 or 3 of them. I hadn’t done a significant amount of research on any of these falls, but I had downloaded a brochure from olympicpeninsulawaterfalltrail.com before we left on the trip.

The first one we stopped at was Vincent Creek Falls. When we searched for Vincent Creek Falls on our GPS, we found no applicable result, but then we searched for High Steel Bridge and got a hit.

About 9 miles north of Shelton, we turned onto Skokomish Valley Road and drove west for about another 10 miles before making a right turn onto Govey Road. This road took us into the middle of nowhere. I know we were in the middle of nowhere, because the road name turned into a number. Govey Road become NF-23, and soon after that, we turned onto NF-3240 before parking on a wide spot in the road and walking out onto the High Steel Bridge.

The High Steel Bridge spans across a deep but narrow Skokomish River valley. From the bridge, you can see the river about 420 feet below. After walking about half way across the bridge, I looked back over my left shoulder and saw the narrow Vincent Creek Falls dropping about 125 feet over the side of the chasm and then winds down into the Skokomish River.

The word is that the falls are most spectacular in the spring and early summer. We were here in July, and so the water was not running very heavy. Even so, the height of the waterfall and the views from the High Steel Bridge made this trip very worthwhile.