Carlon Falls (South Fork Tuolumne)
Evergreen Road (Hwy 120, Yosemite's doorstep) · near Groveland · Sierra Nevada / Yosemite
Swimming & Hot Springs
At a glance
- Temperature
- 58–70°F
- Cost
- FREE (outside the park entrance — no Yosemite reservation needed)
- Season
- July–September for swimming · The falls themselves are best May–June
Worth knowing
- Dogs
- Allowed
- Good for a first timer
- Yes
- Safety
- Granite by the falls is slick; keep back from the lip in higher flows. Because it's outside the entrance station, it needs no park reservation — but it also has no services.
Swimming & Hot Springs detail
- Type
- swimming-hole
- Temp
- cold
- Clothing optional
- No
- Directions
- Evergreen Road off Hwy 120, just BEFORE Yosemite's Big Oak Flat entrance; park at the Carlon Day Use Area and walk the mellow ~2.2-mile round-trip riverside trail to the falls and pools.
- Pools
- A broad, photogenic waterfall over granite ledges into swimmable pools on the South Fork Tuolumne, with warm slabs and pine shade — a genuine Yosemite-country swim without the Yosemite logistics.
- Intl tip
- Groveland's Iron Door Saloon (California's oldest, allegedly) is the Hwy 120 stop. Rainbow Pools, another classic swim spot right off 120 west of the entrance, makes a two-swim day easy.
The guide
Carlon Falls is the Yosemite hack every summer visitor wishes they knew: a lovely granite waterfall and swimming pools on the S…
In the Guidebook
Everything above is yours for free. The written guide to Carlon Falls (South Fork Tuolumne) — what it is actually like, and what we would tell a friend before they went — comes with the Guidebook.
Getting there
- Coordinates
- 37.816, -119.858