Wynoochee Falls

There are multiple routes to the Wynoochee Lake area in Olympic National Forest. The most direct route is to take Highway 12 west from Olympia to Montesano, and exit the freeway at the Devonshire Road exit, then go straight at the intersection at the end of the off-ramp onto Wynoochee Valley Road, and follow Wynoochee Valley Road for 35.5 miles to where it officially becomes National Forest Road 2312 at the junction with NFR-22; a sign at this point will mark the way to the Wynoochee Dam. An alternate route to this point is to take Highway 101 north from Hoquiam for 25 miles, then turn right onto Donkey Creek Road (NFR-22), and continue another 14 miles to the aforementioned junction with Wynoochee Valley Road. From either direction, from the junction continue north on NFR-2312 towards Wynoochee Lake for another 8 miles to a large pullout on the left and park. The trail follows the old campground access road down to the falls in an easy one-third of a mile.Wynoochee Falls is a surprisingly nice waterfall found high up in the Wynoochee River drainage, above Wynoochee Lake in Olympic National Forest. The falls drop over a broad rock wall which acts like a natural dam in the river's course, retaining a large gravel bar immediately upstream of the falls. The river drops a total of 38 feet in two primary tiers, the upper falling 26 feet in the narrow cleft, and the lower spilling another 12 out of the trough into a huge pool below. The rock wall is heavily incised in two or three channels, which causes the river to funnel into multiple narrow troughs depending on how much water is present in the river. During periods of low flow in the late summer, the upper tier of the falls can become essentially invisible from below due to how deeply it's cut back into the bedrock, but it may be possible to look down on it from the top of the falls. Additionally several large logs have wedged themselves in the various cracks in the rock, so the river partially pours over these logs at times, which helps to make the falls a bit more visible - a big flood could easily wash them away and alter the appearance of the falls however. The falls are accessed via an old road which led to the former Wynoochee Falls campground, long since closed and reverted to nature. The trail down to the falls is in good shape thanks to the old road grade, but we were hard pressed to find any obvious evidence of the old campground (we looked for documentation about when it was closed, but couldn't find anything definitive).