Bridal Veil Falls

Bridal Veil Falls drops in two main pillars down the canyon's cliff, fed by streams high in the Wasatch that carry snowmelt through the warm months. The flow is at its most powerful in spring, when the falls roar with runoff, and it eases through the dry end of summer, though the cascade rarely disappears entirely.

A short paved path leads from the parking area to the base, making the falls accessible to nearly everyone, including families with strollers and visitors using wheelchairs. The rocks near the pool are slick with spray, and people are urged not to scramble up the wet cliffs, where serious accidents have happened. Admired from the trail, the falls are a genuine spectacle just off the highway.

The falls are the highlight of Provo Canyon, a deep gorge that carries the Provo River and the highway up from Utah Valley into the mountains toward Sundance and Heber. The canyon walls are steep and layered, and the drive itself is a scenic byway, but the best way to take in the falls and the river is on foot or by bike.

The paved Provo River Parkway runs for miles through the canyon and out toward Utah Lake, following the clear, trout-rich river past cottonwoods and cliffs. Walkers, cyclists, and anglers all share the path, and a trip to Bridal Veil Falls easily grows into a longer outing along the water, one of the most pleasant easy trails in the region.

When winter grips the canyon, Bridal Veil Falls freezes into a spectacular column of ice, its cascades stilled into curtains and pillars of blue and white. The frozen falls are a striking sight from the trail, and they have long drawn ice climbers who come to scale the vertical ice with axes and crampons, a technical challenge in a dramatic setting.

The falls have a colorful modern history, too. For a time a cable tramway carried visitors up to a restaurant perched at the top, said to have been among the steepest of its kind, until avalanches destroyed it. Today the falls are enjoyed from below, a quieter but no less impressive experience in every season.

The Provo Canyon country lies within the ancestral lands of the Ute people, whose bands lived, hunted, and traveled through these Wasatch canyons and along the shores of Utah Lake for generations before settlers arrived. The Ute remain in Utah today, and the city, the lake, and the region carry names drawn from their long presence.

The canyon runs through classic Wasatch high country, with mule deer and the occasional moose in the brush, songbirds and dippers along the river, and raptors riding the updrafts over the cliffs. Spring floods the falls, summer draws crowds to the cool mist, fall paints the canyon in gold and red, and winter freezes the cascade into ice, giving the falls a different face in every season.

The closest Boutel™ stays, so you can turn this stop into an overnight. Each is an independently owned, editorially selected place to stay.