Alamere Falls

The main falls tumbles 50ft down a coastal cliff, but there are a few cascades and another attractive vertical waterfall further upstream. The falls is situated in the southern end of the Point Reyes National Seashore at the Palomarin Trailhead near the reserve's southern end.

Getting to Alamere Falls requires about an 8.5-mile round trip hike through a mostly coastal route affording you views of the coast if you don't encounter coastal fog. The last 1/4-mile involves going through a narrow, overgrown path riddled with poison ivy. You'll want to have a long-sleeved jacket handy for this stretch. After rubbing elbows with the overgrowth, you'll have to scramble down a fairly tame rocky cliff to at least get to the upper falls and cascades.

If you want to get to the base of the waterfall, you'll have to cross Alamere Creek and scramble down the cliff. The cliff scramble is not for everyone, but it is doable and looks a lot worse than it really is. The stream crossing can be tricky during high flow. However, high flow also makes the waterfall expand along the cliff into a thicker multi-columned wall of water.

Even though fog kind of obscured most of the coastal scenery that really would've made the hike a blast, there were wildflowers growing around the falls. There were also some nude hikers (the first time we've ever seen such a thing) on the trail when we headed back to the trailhead so keep that in mind if you find this disturbing.

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Pretty upper cascade

A series of cascades between the upper and lower falls

View of the falls from the beach