Macon

From the junction of US 64 and NC 106 in Highlands, drive 3.15 miles west on US 64 to the signed parking area on the left. This is 13.6 miles east of US 23/441 in Franklin.

“Here is a fall upon whose virgin rocks no quack has painted his shameless sign; whose precipices have not been invaded by the mob of the grand tour; whose solitary magnificence thrills and impresses you as if in some barren land you came upon the dazzling lustre of a priceless diamond. But to this, and its brother a few miles below, the feet of thousands of the curious will hereafter wander.” 

And wander they have. Dry Falls is among North Carolina’s most alluring waterfalls. Beauty, power, geology, biology, photography, history, ease of access, and fun all come together here. Few waterfalls in the state have as much to offer so many different people. About the only thing it doesn’t have is an opportunity for swimming or wading. That’s a big no-no here.

If you want to avoid the crowds at Dry Falls, just get here 

 breakfast. Even on a weekend, you’ll have it all to yourself at 7 a.m. The small parking lot limits the number of visitors at any given time as there is no place to park along the road, but enough people can park here to make you feel like you’re in a can of sardines. A Forest Service official told me several years ago about plans to build a larger parking lot across US 64, with a footbridge crossing the road. I don’t know if that’s still on the books, but I’m glad they haven’t built it yet.

And speaking of not building something, when the road from Highlands to Franklin was on the drawing boards, consideration was given to routing it 

 Dry Falls, just as they did at Bridal Veil Falls. Oh my! If you’ve visited Dry Falls, you know that building a two-lane road behind it would have totally spoiled the waterfall.

The trail down to the falls is not suitable for persons with limited mobility, but an accessible boardwalk leads to a nice view of the falls at the parking lot level.

Read the Cullasaja River section for an overview of the river and its waterfalls, including a list of landmarks with mile markers. You can find it by clicking the Little Tennessee River Basin button on the 

View from parking area and moderate hike to base

Pay the fee and follow the obvious trail to the base of the falls or to the boardwalk view of the falls.

Historical photo by George Masa. This image was used to make postcard 025D-10. (025D-14)

Historical photo by R. Henry Scadin. (025D-15)

Stereograph made from the brink of Dry Falls, circa 1880-1900. (025D-13)

Stereograph of Dry Falls, circa 1880-1900. (025D-12)

Dry Falls illustration from The Heart of the Alleghanies by Wilbur G. Zeigler and Ben S. Grosscup, published in 1883. (025D-19)

Dry Falls illustration from Standard Guide to Asheville & Western North Carolina, published in 1887. Note the caption stating the waterfall is in Franklin County. It is in Macon County. Frankling County is located in the Piedmont region of North Carolina. (025D-21)

Dry Falls illustration from Hand-Book of North Carolina, published in 1893. (025D-22)

Dry Falls illustration used to advertise the new Highlands resort founded in 1875. Note that this illustration is the same one as 025D-20, which was published in The Great South, also in 1875. Do you suppose Kelsey and Hutchinson obtained permission for its use?(025D-24)

Early postcard featuring Bridal Veil Falls, Dry Falls, and Narrows Falls, along with other scenes. (025CD-060J-01)

Early postcard of Dry Falls. This is slightly different version of postcards 025D-04, 025D-05, and 025D-08. All four used the same photo, which I'm pretty sure is 025D-15.(025D-01)

Early postcard of Dry Falls. This is slightly different version of postcards 025D-01, 025D-05, and 025D-08. All four used the same photo, which I'm pretty sure is 025D-15.(025D-04)

Early postcard of Dry Falls. This is slightly different version of postcards 025D-01, 025D-04, and 025D-08. All four used the same photo, which I'm pretty sure is 025D-15. (025D-05)

Early photo postcard of Dry Falls. (025D-06)

Early photo postcard of Dry Falls. (025D-07)

Early postcard of Dry Falls. This is slightly different version of postcards 025D-01, 025D-04, and 025D-05. All four used the same photo, which I'm pretty sure is 025D-15. (025D-08)

Early postcard of Dry Falls created using a photo by George Masa. (025D-09)

Early postcard of Dry Falls. This postcard was created using George Masa photo 025D-14. (025D-10)

View of Dry Falls from the upper observation deck. (025D-263254)

View of Dry Falls from the upper observation deck. (025D-263259)

Winter view from behind Dry Falls. (025D-258715)

Winter view of Dry Falls with ice from frozen spray. (025D-212305)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-61963)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-61953)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-61941)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-61940)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-55429)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-55408)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. Shutter speed 1/80 second. Compare with 025D-55387 which was shutter speed 1/2 second. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-55397)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. Shutter speed 1/2 second. Compare with 025D-55397 which was shutter speed 1/80 second. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-55387)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-55344)

View from the brink of Dry Falls. While making this image, I wore a climbing harness and was safely secured with a rope. My tripod was also tied in to a seperate rope. Note that accessing the top of the falls from the parking area is prohibited. (025D-55334)

Winter view of Dry Falls with ice from frozen spray. (025D-53277)

Winter view of Dry Falls with ice from frozen spray. (025D-53258R)

Winter view of Dry Falls with ice from frozen spray. (025D-53250)

Winter view from behind Dry Falls. (025D-53236)

I shot this image of Dry Falls sometime in the 1990s when the hemlock tree was still standing beside the path. (025D-1567F)

The waterfall is beside US 64 between Highlands and Franklin along US 64.

Get Your Bearings

The Forest Service charges a small fee for visiting Dry Falls. Fee boxes are located at the falls, or you can purchase passes online at recreation.gov. Current fees are $3 per vehicle per day or $15 for an annual pass. Passes purchased for Dry Falls are also valid at Whiteside Mountain and Whitewater Falls.

During winter, the trail is gated to prevent visitors from walking behind the falls and potentially slipping on the ice. Many people climb over the gate, but besides the fact that it is illegal, you should be aware that a fall here could have serious consequences. Even when it’s not icy the area behind the falls is always wet and slippery.

A portable toilet is in the parking area. Bring a nose clip.

Special Considerations

The idea is that you can walk behind the overhanging falls without getting wet—hence, Dry Falls. The only problem with this is that you can’t walk behind the falls without getting wet. There are just degrees of wetness. During low flow on a warm day, the mist will be welcomed. In cooler weather and higher flows, you’ll be running behind the falls and risking a fall.

The waterfall has been called Dry Falls since at least the late 1800s, but in the early years of notoriety, it had a few other names, common among them Cullasaja Falls (not to be confused with the waterfall downstream that currently has that name) and Sugar Fork Falls (not to be confused with Cullasaja Falls, which was once called Sugar Fork Falls). Confused yet?

, published in 1875, Edward King captioned an illustration of the waterfall “The Dry Fall of Sugar Fork.” In the text King stated, “The Hibernianism by which this glorious cascade gets its designation of the ‘Dry Falls,’ was suggested by the possibility of passing beneath the giant shelf, over which it pours, without severe wetting, although the spray is at times blinding.”

Western North Carolina A History 1730-1913

, wrote, “The Dry, or Pitcher Falls, of the Cullasaga [sic] River, four miles from highlands, are so called because the stream leaps from the precipice above and leaves a clear dry space beneath, behind and under which one can pass to the further side dry-shod. It is about seventy-five feet in height and the water pours over the rock ledge from which it leaps much as does a stream poured from the mouth of a pitcher.”

, published in 1883, states, “The most noteworthy cataract, of the plateau region, is located about four miles from Highlands, and known as the Dry Fall of the Cullasaja. The name was given, not for the reason of the fall being dry, but because of the practicability of a man walking dry-shod between the falling sheet of water and the cliff over which it plunges.”

Dry Falls has also been called High Falls.

Naming

Dry Falls supports a rich spray cliff natural community. Among several other uncommon plants, somewhere on those wet cliffs lives a tiny little fern called West Indian Dwarf Polypody, 

. As the name suggests, its typical range is the West Indies. Dry Falls is the only other known location for this plant in the world.

Biology

Morely, from Harpers New Monthly Magazine

Much has been written about Cullasaja River and Gorge, including Dry Falls. As with other North Carolina waterfalls that were written about as early as the 1800s, Dry Falls prose ranges from melodramatic to matter of fact. Here are a couple of entries from the former category.

In 1873, author and journalist Edward King traveled through the South while working for 

. His accounts, including a trip through Cullasaja River Gorge were published as articles in 

 In King’s narrative of Dry Falls, he wrote:

The river, coming to a dizzy height, leaps out with such force, that the water is projected far from the rock, and the beholder seems to see a lace veil, at least sixty feet long, dependent from the hoary walls of the cañon. Passing under it, along the slippery rocks, one comes out upon another stone under beetling precipices, from which little streams run down, and around which the mist and spray rise, and can note the changing gleams of the sunshine as they play on the immense mass of foam suspended between earth and sky.

Below, the stream passionately clutches at the rocks, and now and then throws them down into the chasm; there are hollows in the stones, which have been worn to a considerable depth by the pattering of the spray upon them for hundreds of years. Here a mass of wall rises dozens of feet from the chaos of rocks which is huddled at the fall’s bottom. Many of the rude figures seem to have human resemblances, and one might imagine them giants rising from the cañon’s depths to tear away the veil which has been drawn across the entrance to their cavern.

A hundred and fifty feet below the summit of the falls, the stream runs on in whirlpools and eddies, now forming into inlets in which reeds, ferns and blossoms flourish, and now making a deep, steady current, cold and crystal clear. “The pines and spruces seventy feet high seem but toys by the sides of these immense walls; the light, too, in the gap through the mountain, is strange and fantastic, and seems to cast a glamour over every minute object. Even the pebbles, and the ferns and tiny grass-sprouts in the soil beneath the shelf over which the fall pours, are purple.

Then the voice—the voice of the fall! Heard from the laurel thicket, it seems to come from the very ground under your feet; heard from the cavern into which you pass, it is sombre and complaining, like the winter wind about the house chimneys; and its echoes from the foot of the rapids, to which you may descend if you have firm nerves and a quick step, are like those from some unseen choir in a cathedral gallery,—some chant of priests at High Mass, monotonous, grand, inspiring; ‘the height, the glow, the gloom, the glory,’ all blended, shock and awe the soul.

Entering one day with it a pass in the range, they found themselves at the top of an abyss. The mountain escarped upon the plain in gray bare rocks, over which the river flung itself in a series of passionate leaps. The solitude was breathless; the trees leaned back shuddering from the fearful plunge; overhead thunder-clouds were massing, driven by the angry winds.

"Very fine," said Morely, presently. He was the only one who spoke. "Fine, but savage. Now if these falls were in Europe, they’d have a reputation, and you’d have big hotels, and guides, and calcium lights on them at night, and everything comfortable. Nature is too naked here for my taste."

Literature

As a photographic subject, Dry Falls is on my Top 10 list of North Carolina waterfalls. (Try to ignore the fact that I haven’t been able to trim my Top 10 list down from some 50 waterfalls.) It’s among the few waterfalls that photograph well from all angles and in all seasons. If you show up on an overcast day or early or late when the sun isn’t hitting the falls, you’ll make a good photo. Guaranteed. (Try to ignore the fact that my guarantees mean basically nothing.)

Years ago, there was an ugly chain-link fence under the falls. Photographers hated it because there was no way to make a photo without including it in the shot. The current wooden fence strikes a good balance between the needed safety measures and aesthetic blending. From the river-left side you can use the fence in your photo as a leading line to the falls.

Photography

Typically, waterfalls that support spray cliff natural communities are most susceptible to foot trampling. While the rock walls may be home to a lush environment of plants, some of them very rare, most waterfall visitors don’t disturb them adversely, the occasional hand placed for support notwithstanding.

At Dry Falls, foot traffic is not much of an issue as there are no plants left to trample, but there has been a problem with disturbance on the cliff walls surrounding the waterfall. There are just so many people visiting that there are bound to be a small percentage that have a negative impact.

I once found graffiti carved into the lichens on the rocks at Dry Falls. Renowned botanist Dan Pittillo once told me of witnessing a tourist removing a rare fern from the cliff wall. She was planning to transplant it to an environment where it had no chance of survival.

I don’t know what the answer is. I do think that more is better regarding talking about the negative impacts at waterfalls. Hopefully, reading this will compel someone to speak up when they witness someone destroying the waterfall environment.

Conservation

Be sure to check out the other easily-accessible waterfalls in Cullasaja River Gorge, including 

Accessibility:	Paved path
County:	Macon
River Basin:	Little Tennessee
Watercourse:	Cullasaja River
Watershed:	Medium
Type and Height:	85-foot slide, cascade, and freefall, with most of it freefalling
Landowner:	Nantahala NF, Nantahala RD

Beauty Rating:	9
Elevation:	3360 feet
USGS Map:	Highlands NC/GA
Hike Difficulty:	View from parking area and moderate hike to base
Hike Distance:	About 0.1 miles
Waterfall GPS:	35.06869, -83.23889
Trailhead GPS:	35.06841, -83.23856

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