Upper Copper Falls
Access The opening under the falls is the entrance to the Copper Falls Mine and it is inadvisable to poke around. The workings beyond are vast, steep and flooded in the lower levels, and people have gone in and taken hours to find the way back out.
Plenty of neat little drops in the Keweenaw have seasonal flow, yet only Upper Copper Falls drops directly into an old mine. Owl Creek, a tiny trickle of water through most of the year, empties out of Owl Lake and flows north over a steep volcanic formation before plunging almost six feet and splattering onto a scattered pile of broken rocks. This pile covers up an entrance to Copper Falls Mine, an entrance that is only accessible by the creek now, and the mine swallows up every last drop of water. Look at the opening and leave it there: the adits and shafts behind it are extensive, steep and flooded below, and Tech students who went in have spent hours finding their way out.
The now-dry creek continues downstream, fed only by tributaries from this point on, eventually gaining enough trickles to flow again over multiple drops and slides that form Copper Falls. The water that flows into the mine empties far downstream, by the old stamp sand, at Copper Adit Falls.
Directions
Drive along the Eagle Harbor Cutoff Road, turning right on Brockway/Central Cutoff about a half mile east of Copper Falls Park. Turn left at the track at .4 miles, the last track before the woods open up on the Cutoff Road along a swampy section, and park in the small gravel pit on the track. Follow the drive heading right out of the pit, past the blue mining shaft with a bat cover on top, to an open sandy clearing. The creek and falls sit on the far side of the clearing, maybe a few yards in the forest.
Photographs
Visits
Seen in April and November.
- much more water than I had ever seen
The waterfall was flowing good, much more water cascading down the plunge than I had ever seen. A few yards below the waterfall and the creekbed was dry. This was weird. There was a good amount of water coming down, much more than the snow could have swallowed up. Then it clicked. This area is riddled with shafts and adits from the old Copper Falls mine, and with a cautious step I walked backwards from the base of the falls; if there was enough cracks and holes here to swallow up a creek I didn't feel like taking my chances.
- still only trickling, despite a week of sleet and rain
With the wet weather I hoped that Upper Copper Falls would be flowing. We were disappointed but I took some photos anyways. While we walked around the base of the falls, looking for any signs of the famed adit entrance, a black shape swooped down. A bat was dive-bombing us. It made dives near the water before a wing was caught below the trickling waterfall, then dropped like a rock, falling between the rocks and disappearing.
Comments
7 comments
thanks again for all the info. found these too and loved them!
We tried to find the falls for over an hour, walked all over the area and saw the many stops markers (metal poles in the ground), saw grassy fields and many holes and rock piles but could not find the mine shaft or the falls. Could the mine shaft have been recently removed? Also the track on the left at 0.4 miles now has a big dirt pile pushed up in it to prevent driving.
Huh, that's weird. Did you see the open meadow? I don't think it's likely that the shaft got moved, but it may have happened over the last few years.
Better instructions: Drive on Eagle Harbor Rd from M-41 toward E.H. Look on right for Central Rd - it comes downhill to a stop sign. Turn right onto Central which is a steep but graded hill. At 0.4 miles, look for a left turn. Unless you're in a high-clearance vehicle park on C. Rd. Follow the curve to the right, past an old gravel pit. Skirt several large puddles, go past the blue pipe and walk to a sandy clearing with a circular track. There's a rusty metal post in the center. The faint trail to the falls is on the left of the clearing. If you followed the road to a rocky spine, you went too far.
Thank you, M :)
Do NOT go down into the mine via the opening under the falls. The adits and shafts are vast, steep, and extremely dangerous. The lower levels are flooded. I had friends at Tech who went down and it took them hours to find their way back out.
Found it! Great directions, metal pole is a bit overgrown, but still there!
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