For Seat­tle-area folks, Cher­ry Creek Falls is rel­a­tive­ly close by, just a few miles out­side the near­by town of Duvall. 

A five mile round-trip hike through mossy rain­for­est takes you to the falls and back. At first, you’ll take what feels like a trip back in time, trav­el­ing the remains of a long-aban­doned road, pass­ing an ancient crashed car or two along the way. Even­tu­al­ly, though, you’ll leave the old road behind and delve deep­er into the for­est, fol­low­ing a net­work of paths past sev­er­al lit­tle water­ways and pos­si­bly encoun­ter­ing a few com­mu­ni­ties of bees and mos­qui­toes if you don’t keep mov­ing, before reach­ing the falls — a nice spot for a pic­nic or a lit­tle wading. 

The trip through the for­est is pic­turesque and some­times mys­te­ri­ous, though a lit­tle bush­whack­ing can occa­sion­al­ly be required. The falls are a pleas­ant reward, and this hike is an easy way to get out­side and get a lit­tle exercise.

A pass­ing cloud dumps rain and hail at Rial­to Beach, on Wash­ing­ton state’s Pacif­ic coast, on a dark, mid-Feb­ru­ary afternoon.