Lower Kelley Creek Falls

The Kelley Creek Trail is accessed from the Old Cascade Highway near Stevens Pass. Take Highway 2 east from the town of Skykomish for 6.7 miles to the western end of the Old Cascade Highway - just before the bridge over the Tye River at Alpine Falls (if you reach the Deception Falls parking area, you've gone too far). Follow the Old Cascade Highway for 2.2 miles then turn left onto NFR 6710 and continue for another 1.4 miles to the large parking area and restrooms where the road intersects the Iron Goat Trail. Find Kelley Creek Trail #1076 which heads downhill from the parking area, quickly passing the site of one of two old railroad trestles in the vicinity. The trail crosses Martin Creek on a sturdy foot bridge, then forks - keep to the right and continue heading upstream along the creek. After 2 miles of moderately easy hiking the trail passes near the falls at a switchback. The upper tier is obscured by trees in the gorge (there may be no safe way to get a good look at it), but the lower tier is fairly visible from a few feet off the trail.Lower Kelley Creek Falls is the lesser of the two noteworthy waterfalls along the Kelley Creek Trail near Stevens Pass. The falls drop 43 feet in two steps, first in a 25 foot cascade, followed by a more gradual sliding tumble of 18 feet. The upper tier of the falls is framed tightly by several bulky trees, which make it difficult to see clearly from the trail (or near the trail), but the lower tier is more or less in plain site from just off the path. The basin feeding Kelley Creek covers an area of about 2 square miles - all of it above 3000 feet in elevation - so while it's not huge, it's large enough to ensure a pretty healthy volume of water remains in the creek for the majority of the year. The winter snow pack will persist in the basin well into the early summer months, so the falls (the lower tier anyway) will flow strongly for much of the year. By September however, expect the volume to drop considerably.