[ragman and rodman]

A pleasant forest hike with 8-10 beautiful waterfalls... and if you like waterfalls, this one is definitely for you. Our loop consisted of 4 miles on North Fork Trail #24.2... then 2.7 miles on Swampy Lakes Trail #23... then we closed the loop with a 1.3 mile hike on Bridge Creek Trail #24. Advertised as one of the most popular hikes in Bend, Oregon, most people probably only make the quarter mile hike up the North Fork Trail to the viewing platform that looks down on the 97 foot Tumalo Falls and then return to their car... however, there are nice waterfalls along the trail to where it junctions with the Swampy Lakes Trail at milepost 4... where most folks probably trace their steps back down the North Fork Trail to their car due to an advertised footlog crossing of Middle Fork Tumalo Creek at milepost 4.5. We waded across the slow moving, knee-deep creek because we didn't like the idea of falling off of the footlog and getting tangled up in the footlog branches... plus getting tangled up in freezing runoff from Broken Top's Crook Glacier reconfirmed the idea that wading across was the best idea. The loop hike was 7.9 miles (7.5 miles if you stay on the main trail and don't make short side trips for better viewpoints of some of the waterfalls), gaining 1743 feet of elevation. Photos, trailhead directions and downloadable GPS track of our Tumalo Falls Loop hike. ..