Brownstone Falls Trail

Copper Falls State Park protects a series of spectacular waterfalls carved into ancient volcanic rock in Wisconsin's far north, and the Brownstone Falls Trail is the best introduction to its geological drama. The Bad River has cut a deep gorge through Keweenawan lava flows dating to approximately 1.1 billion years ago, the same age as the volcanic rocks exposed at Porcupine Mountains across the border in Michigan, creating a canyon whose dark walls of basalt and rhyolite are stained copper-green and rust-red by mineral seeps. Brownstone Falls, the first major cascade encountered, drops 30 feet over an angular basalt lip into a plunge pool whose walls display beautiful columnar jointing in the ancient lava. The trail loops through the gorge on maintained paths with numerous viewpoints and observation platforms cantilevered over the cliff edge. Tyler Forks Creek enters the main gorge in a dramatic side canyon further along the loop, contributing a second smaller waterfall before the confluence. The gorge forest of white spruce, balsam fir, and paper birch clings to the canyon walls in soil pockets, their roots visible as tangles along the rock faces. Interpretive panels explain the copper-mining history that gave the park its name, as small surface copper deposits in the same volcanic rock sequence were worked by Native Americans and later by European prospectors.