Wallace Falls State Park is a 1,380-acre public recreation area along the Wallace River on the west side of Washington’s Cascade Mountains, with its entrance about a mile northeast of Gold Bar. It is known for waterfalls and a forested mountain setting shaped by old-growth conifers, fast-moving streams, and backcountry lakes. The park’s name preserves local history in altered form, as “Wallace” is a corruption of the surname of Joe and Sarah Kwayaylsh, members of the Skykomish tribe who were the first homesteaders in the area. The park began in 1971, when Washington purchased the land from the Weyerhaeuser Timber Company. Its central attraction is Wallace Falls, a 367-foot cascade in three sections, with the largest single drop measuring 265 feet, visible from the Skykomish Valley. The park also contains Lower Wallace Falls, which descends 212 feet in five tiers, and Upper Wallace Falls, a 240-foot drop spread across five tiers that cannot be viewed in full at once. Ruins of railroad trestles, abandoned rail grades, and springboard notches cut into old stumps recall the area’s logging past, and today the park has 12 miles of hiking trails, 5 miles of biking trails, and overnight facilities including a campground and cabins.