Havasu Falls

Havasu Falls pours over a cliff of roughly 90 to 100 feet deep inside a side canyon of the Grand Canyon, and what makes it famous is colour. Havasu Creek carries so much dissolved calcium carbonate that its water turns a vivid blue-green, strikingly bright against the rust-red canyon walls. Below the fall the creek spreads into a series of plunge pools held back by natural terraces of travertine — mineral that the water itself has deposited, layer by layer, building rims and ledges that look almost man-made.

The fall has not always looked like this. Before a flood in 1910 the water came over the cliff as a nearly continuous sheet, and the place was then known as Bridal Veil Falls. That flood cut the notch through which most of the water now drops, and later floods have reshaped the notch, the pools and the travertine several times since. It is a young landscape in constant revision: the shape you see is only the latest version.

The canyon belongs to the Havasupai, whose reservation surrounds it and whose village, Supai, lies about a mile and a half upstream — a village with a general store and a cafe, but no road in. The combination of turquoise water, red rock and travertine terraces makes the whole stretch feel less like a desert canyon than an oasis.

Getting there

There is no road to the falls. The trailhead is Hualapai Hilltop on the canyon rim, reached by Indian Route 18, which leaves historic Route 66 about 6 miles east of Peach Springs and runs some 60 miles north across open range; the hilltop has a dirt parking area and no services. From there it is an 8-mile descent on foot, by horse or mule, or by helicopter to Supai, and about 2 more miles on to the falls and the campground. The nearest town listed in straight-line terms is Hurricane, Utah, about 115 km away, and the closest airport by distance is Grand Canyon National Park Airport (GCN), about 60 km away on the South Rim — but by road both are far from the trailhead, and in practice visitors drive in along Route 66.