Kakabeka Falls

About this place

Kakabeka Falls is a waterfall on the Kaministiquia River beside the village of Kakabeka Falls in northwestern Ontario, Canada, about 28 km west of Thunder Bay in a straight line. Its size and easy access have earned it the nickname the Niagara of the North. The water drops 40 metres into a gorge carved out of the Canadian Shield by meltwater after the last ice age. The rock of the falls and the gorge walls is fragile shale that keeps eroding, and it holds some of the oldest known fossils, about 1.6 billion years old. The name comes from an Ojibwe word meaning waterfall over a cliff. The river was once a major fur-trade route to the northwest, with a 1.3 km portage around the falls. The water pours in a broad, golden-brown curtain the colour of coffee over a dark cliff, with spray rising from the gorge. Dense forest surrounds it, colouring up in autumn. The provincial park around the falls was created in 1955 and has viewing platforms along the gorge rim, about 18 km of trails and two campgrounds. Going down into the gorge below the falls is not allowed because the rock is fragile. In winter the falls partly freeze, offering a very different view.