Big Creek Falls

Big Creek Falls is found along the Snoqualmie Lake Trail in the Middle Fork Snoqualmie area near North Bend. Exit Interstate 90 at Edgewick Road east of North Bend, turn north past the Truck Stop, then turn right onto Dorothy Lake Road, which becomes Taylor River Road, and then ultimately the forest service maintained Middle Fork Snoqualmie Road #56. Follow the Middle Fork Road - which turns to gravel at the Mailbox Peak trailhead at the 2.9 mile mark, and becomes notoriously bumpy thereafter for much of the year - for 12 miles to the bridge over the Taylor River. Just past the bridge stay straight where a sign points to the Snoqualmie Lake Trail and go another half-mile to the end of the road at the trailhead. Hike the former logging road turned trail, crossing Marten Creek at the 2.7 mile mark on a footbridge, then Anderson Creek at 3.2 miles where a ford is necessary (water may be shin deep in the spring if rock-hopping isn't possible), Otter Creek at the four mile mark, also via an unbridged crossing where getting your feet wet might be necessary, and then finally the bridge at Big Creek at the base of the falls at the 4.6 mile mark. The fisherman's trail which climbs alongside Big Creek Falls and leads to partial views of upper parts of the falls can be found about 100 feet past the bridge.Big Creek Falls is the final waterfall encountered along the Snoqualmie Lake Trail before it enters the Alpine Lakes Wilderness Area, and the only of the major falls in the area that is truly visible from the trail itself. Big Creek heads in Dream and Pothole Lakes with a catchment basin about the same size as nearby Marten Creek. As the creek runs down to meet the Taylor River it intersects a long stretch of granite benches and slides, similar to nearby Otter Falls, but due to the significantly larger volume of water involved has managed to wear down the rock into a much less pronounced series of falls and cascades which terminate immediately adjacent to the concrete bridge spanning Big Creek along the Snoqualmie Lake Trail - a relic from the days when the Taylor River valley was actively logged. The visible portion of the falls drop 238 feet, though there is a very good chance the overall height is considerably more than that - perhaps up to 350 feet in all. A short distance past the bridge one can find the unofficial Dream Lake trail, which climbs steeply alongside Big Creek and affords some different perspectives of the falls, though to reach any clear views one must scramble off the path and down to the creek. Because Big Creek Falls is the only waterfall that is plainly obvious from the Snoqualmie Lake Trail, it is sometimes confused for Otter Falls since Otter Falls is the only mapped waterfall in the drainage.