Every Trail Tells a Story
Tuolumne Falls
Backcountry flavor in a day’s walk: canyon, camp, and classic falls.
Two signature drops – Tuolumne Falls and White Cascade.
Granite-and-water choreography the whole way.
Follow the Tuolumne River as it drops from meadow grace into granite muscle – riffles giving way to rapids, rapids organizing themselves into falls. This is where the river remembers it’s headed for Hetch Hetchy, and shows you exactly how. The trail to Tuolumne Falls and Glen Aulin is a procession of thresholds: bridges and benches, slickrock and overlooks, each turn revealing another conversation between water and stone.
In a national park that boasts some of the world’s best waterfalls, a relatively modest cascade such as Tuolumne Falls is apt to be overlooked. Not only is it a fraction of the size of the park’s famed falls, it’s located far from Waterfall Central, the Yosemite Valley. Tuolumne Falls’ allure arises as much from the footpath that reaches it as the falls itself. It’s a classic Yosemite backcountry hike along a sterling stretch of the Pacific Crest Trail, a glorious passage along the Tuolumne river, which mesmerizes with its glistening stones, shimmering pools and dancing Rapids.
You leave the bustle of Tuolumne Meadows behind and within minutes you’re in river country This is a day hike with a backpacker’s payoff: a destination that feels far from roads, where the evening light slants down a canyon and you half expect a mule string to appear.
Keep an eye on footing on the steeper, polished sections; in early season some crossings are damp, and in mosquito season…well, you know the drill. The return climb somehow feels shorter because you’ve already banked the views.
From Tioga Road at Tuolumne Meadows Lodge Road, park near the Glen Aulin trailhead (signed). Cross the Dana Fork bridge and follow signs toward Soda Springs/Parsons Lodge and Glen Aulin.
Tramp Old Tioga Road, a wagon road of 1883 vintage as it edges along Tuolumne Meadow then head toward Soda Springs where rust-tinted carbonated water bubbles up. Follow signs toward Glen Aulin, traverse among great granite slabs and lodgepole pine.
PCT contours along the river, then works its way up a granite outcropping that presents views of the river gorge below and Little Devils Postpile on the opposite bank. This basalt pillar was named for its volcanic kinship to rock formations in Devils Postpile National Monument. Descend via rock stairs, cross the Tuolumne River on a bridge and head down-river alongside frisky cascades to reach the fenced viewpoints above Tuolumne Falls. Continue downstream to White Cascade and the Glen Aulin High Sierra Camp.