Minnehaha Falls on Skeleton River is one of those places that I struggled to figure out how to visit. If you look on the map, it is right beside a road, but there is nowhere to park safely, and the climb from the road is a bit too intense for either of us.
I found the answer entirely by accident when I looked at a completely different location that had nothing to do with waterfalls. I was looking for access to a lookout point and stumbled upon the official Muskoka tourism site for trails and found the answer to where to park for these falls.
Of course, it was just down the road, with a large parking lot and marked trails. It even has educational signs and even other minor falls.
I had to smack myself in the head.
Sometimes the obvious escapes me. I looked at this location for years, and it never even dawned on me to examine a couple of kilometres to the east to see my answer.
Now that I had the location for parking, and a route to hike, all I needed was to get in the car and go.
Minnehaha is where childhood innocence meets nature’s wrath.
The trail is on the opposite end and is relatively easy to find from the parking lot. The walk is a beautiful stroll through the woods, and someone put in “fairy homes.” As we searched for the falls, we also started searching for more fairy homes. What a fantastic idea!
It was probably less than 15 minutes from the parking lot when we reached the falls, and I was immediately pleased. Two years of wondering how to get here were well worth it. It was the beginning of summer, so the water flow was still strong, and I immediately put in a mental note to come and see this place during the spring thaw.
Minnehaha Falls is what I would describe as a classic wilderness fall. There are no roads, no dams, nothing to spoil its natural beauty. Woods surround it, and even though the highway is probably only 50 metres to our side, the forest muffles the sound of any car passing by. It is a paradise accessible after only a short hike with a few moderately steep inclines.
We would stay and enjoy this glory of nature, and on the way back, we met a young family with a new fairy home in hand. At age 5, the daughter asked her mother all about the fairies that would live in the house they created. Mom answered her questions, and with childhood innocence, the daughter believed every word her mother had said. Was this family that started placing homes in this forest, or were they adding to it? I love the idea and even thought about starting this and leaving one at each location we travelled to.
From the parking lot in the other direction is Fish Hatchery Falls, two small dams controlling the water level of Skeleton Lake. Various educational signs and a couple of smaller trails feature some of the local geology and plants.
I have created a custom Google Map showing where this location is. Search Hatchery Falls for the parking lot.
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