Beautiful short hike that is around 2 miles total roundtrip in Townsend near the Smoky Mountains. A lot of uphill climbing, but worth it for the waterfall. When we were here this trail was still quite crowded and parking was limited/hard to find so be mindful of that. Otherwise, it's a beautiful site to see. read more

Spruce Flats Falls - Hiking Near Me

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Looking for short, less populated, but still fabulous waterfall hike while visiting Gatlinburg or the Great Smoky Mountains? This is it!!! SPRUCE FLATS FALLS is a very short hike that begins at the Great Smoky Mountains Institute @ Tremont. The waterfall trail begins at the exact same point as the Lumber Ridge Trailhead, but the Lumber Ridge Trail goes left while the Spruce Flats trail goes right. The trail is easy to follow for the most part due to the Institute providing additional signs along the way to help guide you. Various hiking websites have differing difficult ratings as well as differing distances to the falls. My personal hiking experience would rate this as mildly moderate and the distance, according to our tracking systems was around .8 miles to the falls for a grand total of about 1.6 miles round trip. ~ MILDLY MODERATE HIKE The distance is easy, and while there are some steep uphill and downhill sections, my heartrate was never elevated to the point of heavy breathing. Experienced hikers would likely rate this trail on the harder side of an easy scale, primarily because of the difficulty of the terrain. It is heavily laced with exposed tree roots and/or embedded with jagged stones making it important to watch your step and balance. ~ OUR EXPERIENCE Our primary reason for visiting the Smokies was to hike Mount LeConte, which we successfully did the day prior to hiking here to Spruce Flats Falls. LeConte is a beast of a hike with an elevation gain of just under 2,900 feet over 5.5 miles. Comparatively, Spruce Flats Falls trail was a delight, but our legs were still extremely sore from our LeConte hike! The pain made our this hike less joyful, but each painful step was well rewarded with a gorgeous waterfall. Our group included myself, an experienced hiker, a grandmother (64), two single moms (29 & 31), their two kids: Adorable 3 year old Jojo and 10 year old Zeke + my yelp daughter Jess (30). My wife was still sore from the LeConte hike and opted to stay back in Gatlinburg. *** LET ME JUST TAKE A MOMENT TO SAY HOW INCREDIBLE MOTHERS ARE!!! Little 3-year-old Jojo's mom carried her probably more then 1/3rd of the hike, particularly over some of the tougher terrains and didn't break a friggin' sweat!!! I carried her tiny 30 pound body up one of the steeper parts of the trail for about 5 minutes and thought I was gonna die! Jojo's 64 year old grandmother who does not hike at all handled the trail like a champion, even leading the way on occasion. Truthfully I was worried by some of the hiking reports for this trail saying it may be difficult for children, seniors and inexperienced hikers, but our group had all of those and it was not a problem. PLUS it had been raining most of the morning (wetting the trail) and continued with a light dewy drizzle most of our hike. ~ FINAL THOUGHTS Yep, my group included three generations of women on a rainy, misty Saturday and we all had a great time! The falls are beautiful! One of the more beautiful ones I've seen in the area, but hard to see in full from the base. This is definitely a waterfall where the pictures are best if you have a drone that can capture it's full grandeur. My difficulty scale: 0 = no effort required 1-3 = easy 4-6 = moderate 7-9 = difficult 10 = extremely difficult WATERFALL ATTRACTIVENESS: 8 out of 10 OVERALL DIFFICULTY: 4 out of 10 (mostly because of terrain) OUR TRACKING DISTANCE: 1.6 miles round trip from parking area across from the Institute @ Tremont. 2020 / 68 read more

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Excellent hike close to Townsend. Great short hike to get your heart rate up and short enough for most novice hikers.

a lot of uphill and climbing not great for small children although many people did bring kids. beautiful waterfall!!!

We chose to hike this trail because it was supposed to be less busy than other trails and because the waterfalls looked beautiful. We crammed a lot of sightseeing and hiking into a short time in the Smokies and this was one of the shorter highly rated trails. All of these things are actually true. I think we may have just been there at a bad time. The trail is more strenuous than it sounds. It's not the distance and the steep relentless incline. We found the trail rocky and poorly maintained. As we were beginning our hike, another group was finishing and warned us that the trail was "rugged" and recommended walking sticks. There are so many large rocks and roots, I felt like a climbing mountain goat. A rainstorm earlier in the day had made the trail muddy and slippery on top of that, it's a miracle nobody in our family fell or twisted an ankle. Add to that the 90 degree heat in July, and we were pretty miserable on this hike. There were no especially beautiful views, so we comforted ourselves by looking forward to seeing the falls. Unfortunately when arriving at the falls, another family had spread out all over the rocks at the bottom of the falls. Their stuff was on most of the rocks all the way across and they were very loud and didn't even try to move their clothes, phones, backpacks, shoes etc. one little bit to allow us a small area to take pictures in. It really ruined the experience, and we didn't stay very long. Probably should have asked them to move some of their stuff but I was too tired and hot to risk a confrontation. Even though a ranger had told us the parking lot at the Institute was available, it was gated off. There is a lot right across the street that you can use. I suspect that people must have gone astray because the NPS has put up temporary signs on orange cones pointing the way to the falls. There are also small permanent wooden signs that say "falls", so you can't get lost. I would recommend if you want to hike to Spruce Flat Falls, do it when temperatures are cool, and wear sturdy hiking shoes. Hopefully you will meet other hikers that are more considerate that what we experienced. read more

We did this trail after coming from Cades cove. We actually drove past the parking lot by mistake and I saw the lowest cascade of the falls. There are about 5. Spruce flats is the second one. The hike is short, 2 miles round trip. It's quite enjoyable because it's rocky and narrow. The bridge to the Institute was closed so we had to park across the street. The trail is well marked with signs so you can't miss it. The trailhead is to the right of the gift shop. The restrooms are closed currently btw. The beginning of the trail is a bit steep with some switchbacks. This made my back pain act up but the rest of the trail was pretty easy. It is a bit steep, rocky, narrow and muddy/slippery in some sections but I think that makes it fun! Thankfully there weren't too many people on it so we didn't have trouble getting past people going in the opposite direction! We did see a bear, a young cub who was very curious about us humans! He was on a ledge down the slope and was constantly looking up at us humans! A few feet later we passed a small black snake that made the lady behind us shriek! Lol, I admit I don't like snakes either but after growing up in Kenya, land of black mambas and spitting cobras, these don't bother me! There are actually about 5 cascades that I could see. The second one is spruce flats falls and has a nice pool at the bottom. Because the water doesn't fall directly into the pool there are unlikely to be any dangerous currents so in warmer weather it is swimmable! I don't know how long we took to get there and back because I like to sit at the falls for a while. It's no fun just going there, looking and then leaving! I also stop to pick up turkey tail mushrooms for my art work. I found the most HUMONGOUS ones close to the trail head! Enjoy your hike and be careful! read more