Horse Pasture River Waterfalls, Lake Toxaway

Date	Distance	Time	Elevation Gain	Average Moving Time	Year to Date Miles
11/6/2021	5.1 miles	3 hours 7 minutes	915'	1.9	426.2

Map: 

• 100 Favorite Trails of the Smokies and the Carolina Blue Ridge (not for navigation)
• GaiaGps download (best)
• GORG_Map_2021 (nc.gov) (doesn't show navigation to Stairway falls)

Parking: Rainbow Falls and Turtle Back Trailhead

Carolina Mountain Club Challenges:

• 100 Favorite Trails Challenge, Hike #13
• Pisgah 400 Challenge - #499 Rainbow Falls Trail
• Waterfall Challenge - Rainbow Falls
• Waterfall Challenge - Turtleback Falls
• Waterfall Challenge - Drift Falls (Bust-Your-Butt Falls)
• Waterfall Challenge - Stairway Falls

Directions: See 100 Favorite Trails Map

Krummholz and I headed out to Gorges State Park to do a hike on the 100 Favorite Trails challenge. This hike has 4 waterfalls, so I knew Krummholz would love it. The drive to the park was pretty with the fall foliage, and once inside the park, just driving down the park road, the foliage and views were spectacular. We drove past the very nice looking visitor center - I would like to stop in sometime to see if they have a more detailed map of the trails. I continued on to the Rainbow Falls Trailhead. There are 3 parkin areas for the trailhead and they were all full when I arrived. I drove back to the first one, and was able to just wait until someone was leaving. The trailhead has a porta potty.

We started out on the trail at the end of the main parking area. The trail in Gorges park was a wide, easy gravel trail. Eventually you hike into Pisgah National Forest, and the trail becomes more trail like - rocks and roots. First we hiked to the Rainbow Falls. Just wow! This was my favorite of the 4 falls. I read that often you can see a rainbow, but I didn't today. From there, we continued down the trail to Turtleback Falls, another interesting looking falls. And finally we continued on to the less visited Drift Falls at the end of the trail. There are no trespassing signs here, so you can't get as close to the falls. We stopped here and had a lunch break. I let Krummholz swim on leash. We turned back and passed Turtleback and Rainbow Falls again. We passed a camping area, and started looking for the turn off for Stairway Falls. We found the trail, which had branches on the ground across it. This is usually done to tell hikers not to got that way. Since this isn't the main trail, I can see why this might be done. We headed down the side trail. It was a much more challenging trail - less graded, less maintained, lots of blow downs. I saw no one on this trail. We continued on it with obstructed views of the falls. I just kept following the less defined trail until we eventually landed at its end next to the water. From there we could see Stairway Falls, where yes, you can see why it was named that. On the way back up, I stopped to take a picture at a spot, and dropped my phone on a pointy rock. My screen cracked :( That's the first time I've cracked a phone screen. And now my camera doesn't work. Very sad. 

This was a lovely hike, though too crowded for m taste. There were lots of people, lots of dogs. I often ended up hiking behind a group of people. And I would often have to take Krummholz to the side of the trail to let other dogs pass. And the parking was busy. So, this is a hike I'd recommend doing on a weekday instead of a weekend. But certainly a beautiful hike.