Grotto Canyon

April 17, 2015

This trip would be my Walk For Wildlife (+Canadian Wildlife Federation) hike of the year!  I was excited for many reasons, one in particular for the CWF's Species At Risk, and as this would be the first family trip for my girlfriend and I to bring along our new puppy Loki.  The real good news is he was great on camera, as a camera and even better at keeping to the trails with me.

There will hopefully be more trips with him in the future.

The trail itself wan't too terribly rough, however there were sections that had some higher elevation gain.  The biggest issue I crossed was the damage that was dealt back in 2013 when the area had considerable flooding.  As I never been to the area prior to the floods I was trying to trail map where trails had once faded,  This made for some difficulty while trying to navigate with the puppy; so I kept to the creek bed and proceeded to assume that a waterfall would await me at the end.

As there wasn't any water flowing in the creek bed, this made my travels slightly easier since I did have to cross the creek a number of times to pick up a potential trail on either side.  There wan't any sign of a washed out bridge that would lead me to believe that prior to 2013 this was the right path; however I kept to the creek hoping to find a frozen lock of water at the end.  It was apparent to me by looking at the creek bed near the bottom of the mountain, that the flood widened the creek considerably.

I realized after concluding my hike that the waterfall, and Ice Climbing area is off to the side from the Grotto Creek paths.  MY initial thoughts and understanding was that the waterfall I was seeking was named Grotto Canyon Falls; However it turns out that I sought Grotto Falls.  The difference means that the waterfall comes out of Grotto Mountain separately from the Grotto Canyon Creek.

In the end I did find a trickle of a potential waterfall, collecting in pools.  Although this wasn't the waterfall I sought, it is nonetheless a waterfall during months of summer water flow. Make note though that the flow in this area of the creek isn't all together much more grandeur than it appears in these pictures.

Overall this isn't a failure hike since I did manage to investigate the location of a smaller waterfall along the Grotto Canyon.  Although it nonetheless leaves me wanting more from that waterfall I initially sought.