North Region - Hiking Alabama: A Guide to the State's Greatest Hiking Adventures - page 327

Maps: USGS Dugout Valley, Fort Payne, AL; DeLorme: Alabama Atlas & Gaz-
etteer, page 21 G8; park trail maps available for free at country store
Trail contact: DeSoto State Park, 7104 DeSoto Pkwy. NE, Fort Payne, AL 35967;
[phone]; www.alapark.com/desotoresort
Finding the trailhead: From Fort Payne on I-59 at exit 218, head east on Glenn
Boulevard SW / Pine Ridge Road SW 1 mile and turn left onto Gault Avenue
South. Travel 1.1 miles and turn right onto Fifth Street. Travel 0.4 mile and turn
left onto Wallace Avenue NE. Follow Wallace Avenue NE 2 miles and turn left
onto CR 89 / DeSoto Parkway NE. Travel 5.7 miles and turn left onto DeSoto
Parkway. In 1.2 miles the parking area will be on the right and clearly marked.
The trailhead is across the road to the south. GPS: N34 30.069' / W85 38.057'
The Hike
DeSoto State Park is packed with breathtaking water features. Several waterfalls
can be found here as well as the churning waters of the West Fork of Little River.
Add to the mix lush forests and colorful wildflowers, and you can understand why
the park is known as the “Home of Mother Nature.”
The Falls Loop Trail takes you to three of those beautiful falls using their name-
sake trails: Lost Falls, Laurel Falls, and Azalea Cascade. There is great news for
hikers: Since the last edition, damage from past major ice storms and more recent
tornados along these trails has been cleared, and the paths are hikeable once again
and beautiful. Each is now clearly marked with paint blazes on trees or on the
rock trail bed: orange for Laurel Falls, red for Azalea Cascade, and blue for Lost
Falls. You will still see remnants of the damage from these storms, mainly
downed trees, along sections of the hike. They make great reminders of the power
of nature.
The hike begins at the Lost Falls Trailhead, a gravel parking lot off of CR 618.
It is a nice large parking area with ample room for twenty-plus cars. There is a
nice restroom here as well. The trail begins across the road from the parking lot to
the south. Two bike trails also come in here: the Family Bike Trail from the north
behind the restroom, and the Never Never Land Loop across the road next to the
Laurel Falls Trail to the west.