Lower Bugaboo Falls

Take Highway 95 to the town of Brisco, located about 30 kilometers north of Radium Hot Springs. In Brisco, turn west on Brisco Road and cross the Columbia River. Continue on Brisco Road for 11 kilometers, keeping to the right at all major junctions, to the Lower Bugaboo Falls Recreation Trail and adjoining parking area on the left side of the road (if you start to go down a hill or cross Bugaboo Creek, you've gone too far). The trail starts out level but undulates up and down a bit as it traverses the forest high above the Bugaboo Creek canyon. The trail splits in several places, but all forks seem to end up in the same place at the viewpoint at the top of the falls. A high viewpoint above a gooseneck bend in the creek is reached after 1.5km of hiking, and a distant view of the falls from the side of the creek is found a few hundred meters further along the trail. From the creekside view the trail scrambles steeply up out of the canyon then traverses another 300 meters to the main viewpoint of the falls near its brink.Lower Bugaboo Falls is the larger of the two major waterfalls found along Bugaboo Creek as it descends from the glaciers adorning the spectacularly jagged Bugaboo Spires to join with the fledgling Columbia River near Spillimacheen. The falls drop 19 meters in a rugged canyon, thundering first onto a small ledge where the water is split by a protruding shoulder of rock; the majority of the stream plunging again in a nearly sheer fall to the base of the canyon, while a lesser portion of water is funneled through a natural arch on the right side of the falls. During periods of high flow the creek overwhelms the arch and it becomes almost completely submerged on the upstream side, and on the downstream side a powerful jet of water appears to be exploding right from the face of the cliff. Later in the year when the flow of the stream is lower, the arch is more visible and the water actually appears as if its flowing under the arch rather than emerging from underground. Bugaboo Creek is effectively a creek in name only. The stream is legitimately river-sized, draining an area of approximately 375 square kilometers (145 square miles) on the east slopes of the Purcell Mountains, rising up to elevations of over 3,000 meters and sourcing from multiple large glaciers - the Bugaboo Glacier being the single largest contributor to the creek's volume. Flow at Lower Bugaboo Falls will be strong year round, and though it will be reduced in the autumn months the lower flow will only serve to make the unique geology found at the falls more visible.