Coal Creek Falls — Saturday, Apr. 30, 2016

Issaquah Alps > Cougar Mountain

This was a very nice hike around Cougar Mountain between Newcastle and Issaquah. Even though you're between two towns it was actually very peaceful. You can do a loop if you take the Red Town trail to the Cave Hole Trail to the Coal Creek Falls trail to the Quarry trail to the Indian trail back to the Red Town trail. But whichever path you take, I would bring a map and pay close attention to the signs along the way. The hike is through beautiful forest with several interesting trees along the way, some of them fairly big. It's different than hiking in the mountains like around Snoqualmie Pass since there are a lot less conifers and a lot more deciduous trees. The falls themselves aren't that impressive if you're used to hiking to bigger falls in the mountains, but still pretty, and the moss around the falls was gorgeous. The bugs were a bit annoying at the falls, but not on the trail. It only took us a couple hours to do the hike, including stopping often for pictures and spending several minutes at the falls. I had my 12-year old son with me. Saw lots of people including many younger children.