Snoqualmie Falls

Where it sits. Snoqualmie Falls drops 82 metres over a basalt lip on the Snoqualmie River, between the towns of Snoqualmie and Fall City in King County, about 45 minutes east of Seattle by Interstate 90 and State Route 202. The river gathers three forks out of the Cascades above North Bend, crosses a flat agricultural valley, and then falls off the edge of it into a plunge pool and a wooded gorge. The drop is higher than Niagara, though the volume is a fraction of it, and the whole thing is visible from a viewing deck a short walk from the parking lot — which is why it draws well over a million visitors a year and why the parking is the hard part of the day.

Whose place it is. The falls are central to Snoqualmie Tribe belief: this is where the Snoqualmie People were created, and the mist rising from the plunge pool carries prayers between earth and the Creator. The surrounding ground has been used for burials and ceremony, and in 2009 the falls were listed on the National Register of Historic Places as a Traditional Cultural Property — a designation that recognises living cultural significance rather than architecture. The tribe operates a casino and hotel on the ridge above, and has been active in the management and interpretation of the site.

The hidden power plant. In 1898 and 1899 Charles Baker's Snoqualmie Falls Power Company excavated a cavern roughly 80 metres below the river bed and installed generators in it — the first completely underground hydroelectric plant in the world, still operating today. A second plant was added downstream in 1910. Water is diverted above the lip to feed them, so what pours over the falls varies with season and generation: in a wet February the falls fill the whole rock face and the spray reaches the upper deck, while in a dry late August the flow can narrow to a couple of ribbons. Anyone travelling specifically to photograph a full curtain should come between November and May.

On screen. For a generation of viewers this waterfall is the opening image of Twin Peaks. David Lynch and Mark Frost shot the pilot in the Snoqualmie Valley in early 1989, and the title sequence pairs the falls with the mill and the sycamore-lined stretch of Reinig Road. The lodge perched on the south lip — the Salish Lodge, built in 1916 as the Snoqualmie Falls Lodge for travellers crossing the pass, then rebuilt and enlarged in 1988 — is the exterior of the Great Northern Hotel. Here is the detail that trips people up: none of the Great Northern's interiors were filmed there. The lobby, dining room and the log-walled rooms viewers remember were shot at Kiana Lodge on Agate Passage near Poulsbo, a two-hour drive away across Puget Sound, which also supplied the Blue Pine Lodge and the shoreline where Laura Palmer's body was found. Guests who book the Salish expecting to walk into the Great Northern find a well-run modern spa hotel with a famous view and a very good breakfast instead. The 2017 revival, Twin Peaks: The Return, came back to the same exteriors.

What you actually do. The upper park is a two-acre viewpoint with an observation deck, interpretive panels, gift shop and a small garden, all level and paved. A trail of about 800 metres switchbacks down to a lower boardwalk and river-level platform, with roughly 80 metres of elevation to regain on the way up; it was rebuilt in the 2010s and is well graded but not accessible. The lower viewpoint is where the mist gets you and where the scale registers. Downstream, the Snoqualmie Valley Trail and the Northwest Railway Museum in Snoqualmie fill an afternoon, and the falls are a natural pairing with Twede's Cafe in North Bend for anyone doing the Twin Peaks circuit.

Getting there and timing. Take Interstate 90 east from Seattle to exit 25 and follow Route 202 north, or exit 27 and come through Snoqualmie; there is bus service from Seattle via Issaquah but it is slow. Two lots serve the upper park and both fill from mid-morning on any dry weekend between May and September. The site is open daily and free. Winter mornings after heavy rain give the biggest water and the emptiest deck, though the spray freezes on the railings in a cold snap. The valley below fogs in regularly in autumn, and when the fog sits at the lip of the falls the view from the deck is one of the more unusual sights in western Washington.