Bushkill Falls is a privately owned park with 8 waterfalls. Eastern Pennsylvania is full of waterfalls that you can see for free so is it worth paying?
When we visited the price of this park was $15 per person, your experience may vary. The way it works here is that the last tickets are sold an hour before the park closes and you have to be off the trails an hour later. For our day we arrive around 2:30pm, last tickets were at 4pm and closing was at 5pm. One thing we were disappointed to learn was that most of the shops/food at the park entrance closed at 4pm and not at the trail closure time so keep that in mind.
So what's the experience here?
This park consists of two distinct areas. The main falls area is dominated by an incredible amount of boardwalks clinging to the side of the gorge. The main falls would be almost impossible to view without these! The second area is a natural hiking area that is mostly dirt paths. Both contain waterfalls, 8 in total, and a copious and strenuous number of stairs!
You've been warned...
The main fall is located right near the entrance to the trail head. You can head down the stairs directly in front of you for a view of the top [and a connection to the full loop trail] before heading down the stairs where you'll get a grand view of the fall from the front. Continue following the stairs down and you will also get a view of from the base of the falls. Both angles pictured to the right.
The question of whether a visit here is worth it really is a personal opinion, to me I believe you need to then take the natural hike and do the full loop of the park to make the $15 worth it. Don't be put off by the warning signs, I believe anyone can do this trail but you may wish to bring water. After reaching the bottom of the first gorge you will ascend for a third of your hike.
This brings us to one of the oddities of this park. You will first encounter Brides maid falls, then bridal veil falls... followed by bridesmaid falls... number 2. I'm not sure I've ever seen a park with two waterfalls that share the same name! Still, they're very nice to look at and well worth the extra effort to get to.
Once you reach the top of these three falls you begin your long hike back. There isn't much to see in this area, it's just a nice walk through the woods. Head east at the fork to reach another water fall, but before you do you'll encounter the rock garden. Possibly the largest gathering of Carnes I've seen in the middle of nowhere.
Up next is Pennell Falls, one of the smaller features at the park. It is wider and has more water flow then the bridal falls but is maybe 8 feet tall, I would guess.
At this point you'll begin to head south and shortly after onto a board walk back to the starting point where you first encounter the main Bushkill Falls.
At this point we had a wonderful encounter with a Deer and her Fawn by the river. We were maybe 20 feet away and it didn't seem all that worried about us. It was attempting to cross the river but it was a bit to slippery for the fawn to safely make it.
When other people began to approach it decided to head back into the woods. It also decided to pee into the brook in front of us... I will not be posting those photos...
The final spot we traveled through was another gorge. As you first descend past the main falls you go through the lower gorge which I don't have photos of, but is on our video. This upper gorge is smaller but the board walk also passes in front of it which makes for nicer photos.
At this point you can simply head out of the park and leave or you can climb a bunch of stairs and hike up hill to the Delaware valley look out... view point... overlook... I can't seem to get the name here correct so I give up. This is the spot that you would have reached if you had headed south from the fork in the road way back. Is it worth the climb? that's up to you. We had a very cloudy day and it was beginning to absolutely pour on us so the view is hard for me to judge but I still enjoyed it. Its a lovely deck with benches to enjoy.
So is Bushkill Falls worth it? I think so.
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