Scenic & Romantic
Chase Cliff Falls at Kanaka Creek
Five minutes from the parking lot, Kanaka Creek has carved a sandstone canyon with a waterfall that locals swim under all summer.
Kanaka Creek Regional Park, Cliff Falls
More infoScenic & Romantic
Five minutes from the parking lot, Kanaka Creek has carved a sandstone canyon with a waterfall that locals swim under all summer.
Kanaka Creek Regional Park, Cliff Falls
More infoCliff Falls is the kind of place locals treat as obvious and everyone else somehow never finds. Kanaka Creek has carved a sandstone canyon in Maple Ridge into bowls and chutes, and a five-minute walk from the parking lot lands you on a footbridge staring straight down the falls. In summer the pools below double as a swimming hole. Show up, walk five minutes, act like this is a normal Tuesday.
Park in the gravel lot at the end of 256th Street next to the sports field (the 251st Street side gets jammed on weekends, this entrance is the local move) and walk the wide gravel path five minutes down to the footbridge. Stop dead-centre on the bridge: that's the postcard angle straight down the falls into the sandstone bowls, and it's where everyone's favourite couple photo gets taken. Don't miss the unofficial side trail on the far bank that drops to the lower pools, in July and August this is the natural swimming hole and rock-slide that locals grew up on. Keep going another 15 minutes toward the Bell-Irving fish hatchery if you want to stretch the walk; otherwise loop back and claim a fire-pit picnic table for a packed lunch. Timing trick: after heavy rain the falls thunder, but the rocks get slick, wear actual shoes, not the flip-flops everyone regrets.
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