Cascade Falls Trail is a 2 mile lightly trafficked loop trail located near Matchwood, Michigan that features a waterfall and is rated as moderate. The trail is primarily used for hiking and trail running and is best used from May until November.
kid friendly
hiking
trail running
forest
views
waterfall
Thankfully the moderator allowed the trail to be put in the proper location so I'm redoing my review of this trail. The road to the trail-head is well marked on Forest Road 400. The trail itself seems to be moderately used going to the waterfall, but along the way we noticed that there was a faded sign pointing up the hill to an upper loop. This is really easy to miss because the trail looks like it gets very light use. I recommend going up instead of just going out to the waterfall if you love to hike, see great views, and enjoy the forest.
On the upper trail there are several lookouts over the valleys around the hill that are really beautiful. My wife and I would have loved to be up there during fall colors, or a sunset. The forest is really beautiful also. Lots of diversity, lots of rotting trees on the ground that have many kinds of mushrooms and moss growing on them. It is a bit strenuous to get up there though, but well worth it.
The waterfall was good but not as impressive as the photos I had seen. I think if we were there during higher water on the river it would be better. There were some mosquitoes at the waterfall due to standing water, but we encountered none on the upper trail. But the hike to the waterfall was absolutely beautiful, so it made it all worth it.
I'm hesitant to recommend the trail because of the natural beauty of it and more traffic will ruin some of that beauty, but I also want others to enjoy the experience we did also. Thankfully you won't need to spend an hour searching for it like we did :)