Lazy Bear Falls

Lazy Bear Falls is found south of the North Cascades National Park boundary in the Bacon Creek valley near Marblemount. Drive the North Cascades Highway (US 20) east from Marblemount for almost 5 miles. Just after crossing Bacon Creek, turn left onto Bacon Creek Road #1060. As of 2018 a rock slide has partially blocked the road around the 4.7 mile mark, and only high clearance vehicles can drive beyond it. It isn't clear whether the forest service will repair the road or not. After the slide the road becomes considerably rougher. Follow the main road at a fork at the 5.5 mile mark, and cross Bacon Creek on a bridge shortly after. Continue another mile to the next fork in the road at a tight switchback, and keep right (again the road heading right is heavily overgrown at this point). Follow the road to its end in another 8/10 mile. This final 8/10 mile of the road is water barred and heavily overgrown, and should be done on foot. At the end of the road, find an obvious trail at the downhill apex of the clearing (not near the creek) which will lead shortly and easily to good views of the falls.Lazy Bear Falls is a significant waterfall located near the mouth of Falls Creek, itself a tributary of Bacon Creek, a few miles outside the border of North Cascades National Park. Falls Creek drains from a high basin on the east flank of Diobsud and Electric Buttes, both an extension of the Bacon Peak massif. As it flows from elevations over 6,000 there is significant snow melt feeding into the creek as well as melt from several small glaciers. By the time the creek reaches the valley floor and plunges over the back-to-back 27 and 47 foot punchbowl drops which make up Lazy Bear Falls the volume of the creek is considerable. During the spring and early summer months when snow melt is at its peak, the falls upper tier thunders into its basin and then the creek splits into two segments as it plunges over the lower tier. By late summer and autumn the volume is reduced such that the lower tier of the falls is a single, very narrow punchbowl type plunge. At nearly any time of year the recess behind the falls can be traversed for an even more unique perspective. Falls Creek has a drainage area of approximately 5-1/2 square miles, extending up to the summits of Diobsud and Electric Buttes, and running part way up the shoulder of Bacon Peak. A small glacier on Electric Butte provides the primary source of flow to the creek in the summer, but numerous permanent snow patches along the ridge also contribute. Because the basin features both high elevation and low elevation terrain, the flow of the creek remains quite consistent throughout the year, though reduced in the late summer and autumn months when there is no longer any active seasonal snow melt.This waterfall has for the most part been referred to simply as Falls Creek Falls, no colloquial names are known. The name Lazy Bear Falls was suggested by Burlington resident and waterfall hunter Aaron Young after a visit to the falls resulted in encountering a lethargic black bear scrounging in trash left in the parking area / campsite at the end of the road next to the falls. Falls Creek itself is thought to have been named for the presence of this waterfall.