Wildcat Branch Falls consists of FOUR waterfalls and a one mile lollipop loop style hiking trail. It is located at Wildcat Wayside near Cleveland, South Carolina. This is a nice addition if you’re already in the area visiting Table Rock State Park, Caesar’s Head State Park or Jones Gap State Park. Parking is available on an oversized shoulder at the side of the road at the trailhead. Your first experience will be entering the trail and then finding two waterfalls immediately. Before going I was under the impression from various sources that I’d simply find a “Lower Wildcat Branch Falls” at the start of the trail. The reality is there are TWO lower falls. Zero hiking is required to see them.
After you see these falls you’ll find the Wildcat Wayside trail map. I’ve taken the liberty of scribbling some notes on it here to clarify where all the falls are. Note that not long after you find the map, you’ll pass the chimney where the plaque is telling you about this place originally being called the Greenville Wayside Park.
Following the mile long trail in its lollipop loop shape, heading clockwise you’ll cross a stream, head uphill, and find the Upper Wildcat Branch Falls. This is one of those waterfalls that towers above you as you try to stand at the base on boulders and trees that have crashed down over time, looking up to see water awkwardly running down a slightly less than vertical cliff. Photos won’t do it justice, but it is a pretty neat view to angle your head backward and take in.
Continuing clockwise on the loop you’ll head eastward toward what the map simply calls “Falls” and is neither the Upper or Lower fall, but also doesn’t get a “middle” designation because it is on a different creek. This is just a tiny one, but it is adjacent to the trail so you might as well take a look as you hike by it. So at this point that makes four waterfalls at the Wildcat Wayside!
I wasn’t sure while I was there who was in charge of this little park, but I did talk to a ranger at Ceasar’s Head State Park and she seemed pretty certain that it had changed statuses many times over the years, but that they were currently in charge of the place. But I was cautioned that it isn’t somewhere they send people out to keep an eye on. So on that note, there wasn’t an entry fee and there’s no oversight present, so it seems a little more “wild” of a place than the state park system would otherwise maintain.
Address: 5500 Geer Hwy, Cleveland, SC 29635
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