Bear Creek Falls – Glacier National Park

Bear Creek Falls – Glacier National Park

Bear Creek Falls is one of the easiest hikes you can find in Glacier National Park (Canada). The trail head is right next to Highway One, so it is perfect for a short stop-off as you are driving through this incredible National Park. The Waterfall descends out of a hanging valley flowing down from the spectacular Rogers Pass. This is an energetic, super splashy waterfall. If you visit in the summertime, be prepared to get completely soaked!

Bear Creek Falls trail map

Bear Creek Falls – the basics

Waterfall details: Horsetail (or tiered horsetails if you count the sections above.)
Height: 20m drop for lower section (55m total drop)
Cost:
You need to have a discovery pass to enter Canadian National Parks.
Once you have that, it is free.
How much time do you need: At least 30 minutes
Mini hike distance: 1.2km
Elevation gain: 54m
Dogs: Dogs will love it. Just keep them on a leash.
Facilities: Fancy pit toilets at the trailhead
Extra notes: This one is short, but steep. You’ll want grippy shoes so you don’t slide on the way down. If you want to go up close to the falls you will end up all soggy from the spray.

Bear Creek Falls – Getting started

It’s very easy to reach this waterfall! Heading North on Highway One, watch out for the green signpost for Bear Creek Falls on the left 11km after Roger’s Pass. There is a short road that leads to a wide car park with loos (above) and a sign that marks the trailhead (below.)

This is such a short walk, that we didn’t carry the 10 essentials. However as the sign mentioned the area is home to both grizzly and black bears; We did bring our bear spray.

Head downhill

Follow the trail (steeply) downhill for about 400m until you reach some steps down to Connaught Creek. This Creek used to be called Bear Creek. They just didn’t bother to adjust the name of the waterfall when they changed the name of the creek. Once you make it down, follow the trail right, along the creek.

Bear Creek Falls from Connaught Creek

This is the first view of Bear Creek Falls from Connaught Creek. Now you’ve hiked down one set of stairs, you need to hike up a different set of stairs to get a little closer.

Get read to be soggy

As soon as we reached the falls, I went up as close as I could…but there was sooo much spray that it was hard to keep my eyes open. It’s basically impossible to take close-ish photos of the waterfall, as your camera lens will be covered in water vapor. I was drenched.

I found that if you climb down to the river, you can find sheltered spots that shield you from the gusts of wind produced by the waterfall. It’s hard to see from photos, but there was so much power in this waterfall!

We visited Bear Creek Falls on a hot summers day when the air was filled with smoke from forest fires, so it was sooo nice to start our day by getting soaked by this fabulous waterfall.

Save some energy for the walk back

The only downside to visiting Bear Creek Falls is that you need to hike uphill the whole way back. Still, the effort is totally worth it.

This is just a teeny post for a short but sweet stop off in Glacier National Park. Bear Creek Falls is really impressive for a waterfall you can visit with so little effort. I totally recommend stopping here, rather than driving straight through!

Other Waterfalls near Glacier National Park

We visited quite a few waterfalls on this (and previous) trip(s). I will add more to the map below as I create posts for them. In case you are looking for other waterfall adventures. Green waterfalls you can visit with no walk, light blue will require an easy walk and dark blue are waterfalls that need longer/intermediate hikes to visit.

Please click on the pins below if you’d like to save the information for later.

Bear Creek Falls - Easy walk in Glacier National Park, Canada Easy Hike in Glacier National Park - Bear Creek Falls

34 thoughts on “Bear Creek Falls – Glacier National Park

    1. It is pretty fabulous in this area in the summer! I remember you were planning to come before covid-19 hit. I hope you still can at some point!

    1. Lol sorry! I was a bit worried about that (as I had the same thing when I first saw posts about the American Glacier National Park…and that is way more famous!) I am glad your saw the “(Canada).”

      I do love the look of the Glacier National Park on your side of the border too though!

    1. Thanks Hannah! This one is pretty good isn’t it! It’s actually a bit mad, but we saw two other waterfalls on the same day that were both *even more* impressive! I can’t wait to share them next!

  1. Bear Creek Falls is so beautiful! Sounds like a perfect day hike in Canada’s Glacier National Park.

    1. Thanks Karen! It’s a little short if it’s the only hike you do in Glacier NP, but it is a fab little stop-off. 🙂

  2. This looks like a great hike! Had no idea glacier extended into Canada. We are looking at going there this coming summer!

    1. Oooh no, it’s still pretty far from the Glacier National Park in the USA – I think it’s about 500km away. It’s better to visit the Canadian Glacier National Park when you go to other areas in the Canadian Rockies. 🙂

    1. Yeees! The USA Glacier National Park looks even more full of epic hikes. To be honest the Canadian one is much smaller, less famous than the other National Parks near here.

  3. I would love to go on this trail in the fall and see all of the pretty colours! I love hikes that have waterfalls along them so this looks perfect to me.

    1. Oooh I wonder if there would be many trees that change in the autumn!? Lots of the trees around the falls were deciduous, so it might look pretty similar!

    1. Oooh which one did you end up doing? We did the same…we’d driven past the sign on a couple of occasions before we stopped to check it out.

  4. Glacier National Park looks so beautiful! At first I thought you meant it would be nice to take a dip in the waterfall on a hot day, but definitely good to know that there is actually a pretty big “splash zone” near the waterfall! hahah. Thanks for the guide!

    1. Yees! It was a splash zone rather than a dip zone! The water didn’t look particularly safe for taking a swim.

  5. This looks like another excellent hike!I love the picture of you soaked by spray– I know that feeling and its wonderful! Thank you for the detailed guide.

  6. What a gorgeous area to hike in! I’m planning to visit Glacier National Park in Montana sometime in the next few years, and your post has me convinced I need to extend my trip to the Canadian side as well!

    1. Ooh just so you know, the two parks don’t meet up (I think they just share a name…but they are more than 500km apart.) I think they are both worth a visit though.

  7. I love waterfall hikes! Since I live in the desert, any hikes with water are so fun for me. If I ever find myself in Glacier National Park, I’ll have to give this one a try 🙂

    1. It’s funny, I am so excited by desert landscapes for the same reason, I love them! But year, waterfalls are always fab (and they are different each time you visit!)

    1. I think you can still reach it in winter. I’ve seen photos of it all frozen – it looks unreal! You’d need to be careful and bring crampons/snowshoes. If the car park is closed, you’d need to park by the gate and hike in a little further.

  8. We love waterfalls, and the bigger the better! I also love that this is easy to get to. Then we can easily bring the kids!

  9. It seems all you do these days is visit waterfalls Josy!

    I’m insanely jealous, haha. Although we have waterfalls here, we don’t have any glacier fed ones. I’m always mesmerised by the colours of the pools that glacial fed waterfalls flow into. This one is no exception.

    1. Lol yeah, we did visit a lot over the summer! It’s mostly because it’s still fun to visit them in the smoke (when it’s less sensible to be up high in the alpine.)

      I totally agree. The glacial blue always knocks my socks off. 🙂

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