Exploring Keystone Canyon: Bridal Veil Falls and Horsetail Falls

If you are visiting Alaska and looking for a great drive, the trip south from Glennallen to Valdez is tough to beat. The route climbs south parallel to Copper River. Eventually it ascends up and over Thompson Pass in the Chugach Mountains and passes the Worthington Glacier before descending into the spectacular Keystone Canyon. This canyon was first used as a route for a train line to the interior gold mines, and you can still see the old tunnel built nearly a century ago.

The Lowe River runs through the bottom of the canyon, creating a dramatic backdrop for two of the most famous waterfalls in the region. While many people search for these names in California, the Alaskan versions in Keystone Canyon offer a much more rugged experience.

This route parallels the nearby Copper River.

Finding Stillness, Horsetail Falls

Here’s a photo from my trip down the Richardson Highway – Memory Lane.

This one is Horsetail Falls, another waterfall in Keystone Canyon and the Lowe River, just south of Bridal Veil Falls, (that image is posted below).

Waterfalls are so cool; I can sit and stare at a waterfall for hours, it seems, never tiring of the flow. The energy of the falls is often spellbinding.

I first visited this particular area, along the Lowe River in Keystone Canyon, on a trip to Valdez in 2000. That trip seems like several lifetimes ago now. It rained most of the time, and I left soon after, heading north to Wrangell-St. Elias National Park for a backpacking trip. I wish I hadn’t taken so long to return.

In this photo I wanted to illustrate that sense of being captivated that waterfalls so often impart.

Rather than quickly set up for a shot that expresses that feeling, I simply sat and enjoyed the waterfall for a while .. nearly an hour. People came and went, and I just sat and enjoyed the falls; after a while, I knew exactly how I wanted to shoot this scene. I’d been on the far side of the falls from where this image was taken, but I knew that this was the composition I wanted. So, I wandered down to my truck, grabbed my camera, walked up the little trail to this vantage point, set up my tripod and camera, hit the timer, and went and stood in front of the camera. I took 2 more images afterward, but the first one is definitely my favorite. Sometimes it just happens like that.

If you’re visiting Alaska and looking for a great drive, the trip south from Glennallen to Valdez is pretty tough to beat. it’s a little over 100 miles, and climbs up over Thompson Pass, in the Chugach Mountains, and the Worthington Glacier. The descent down to Valdez through Keystone Canyon is a fun drive. You can even still view the old tunnel, built nearly 100 years ago, when the canyon was first used as a route for the train line running to the copper and gold mines of interior Alaska.

Keystone Canyon, with all these killer waterfalls, is a popular ice climbing destination in the winter (keep an eye out here for some of those photos this coming winter). Highly recommended!

Bridal Veil Falls Photo and the Lowe River

Here’s a photo I took on my trip down the Richardson Highway to Valdez.

I took off from Glennallen one rainy, nasty morning to revisit the area. I hadn’t been down to Valdez in years, and so it was a nice way to spend what looked like might be a day of dreary weather. I also wanted to photograph a couple of the waterfalls along the road, this one and Horsetail Falls as well, which is just around the bend from Bridal Veil Falls.

This kind of location is difficult to shoot, for me, as the scene doesn’t offer a lot of options regarding a vantage point. The river in the foreground, Lowe River, is uncrossable, unless you have a boat. I, of course, did not have a boat with me. So the photographer here is pretty limited to shooting from across the river, and that makes it difficult to come up with any compositional variations.

Similarly, without a heavy overcast day, including the sky wasn’t a great option either. The road runs immediately behind where I shot this image from, so backing away would drastically change the nature of the photo, by including the road in the foreground. Not necessarily a bad thing, but that wasn’t what I was looking for. Perhaps I’ll go back one day in better conditions and shoot it again, with the road and a motor vehicle in the foreground, as a ‘travel photo‘.

I actually climbed the west wall of the canyon quite a ways, trying to find another vantage point. I found a spot to shoot from, but didn’t manage to make an image that I liked. Sometimes the generic is the best option for a good reason.

I shot this scene a little, headed on down the road to Horsetail Falls, photographed that, ventured further south to Valdez, enjoyed fresh Halibut, fries and a latte, and then turned to drive back north. On the return drive, I noticed this tiny sliver of blue sky open up, and thought I’d reshoot Bridal Veil Falls while the sky was something more (if only a little) than battleship gray. That’s when I took this photo.

A Glimpse of History: The Keystone Canyon Tunnel

The rugged walls of Keystone Canyon hold more than just waterfalls; they are home to a relic from the early 1900s known as the “hand-cut tunnel“.

This tunnel was part of a fierce competition between rival railroad companies fighting to establish a rail link from the coastal port of Valdez to the copper riches of the interior (particularly the Kennicott Mines near McCarthy). The conflict famously escalated into a shootout known as the Keystone Canyon Railroad War, which ultimately halted the project and left the tunnel unfinished.

Today, you can still see the hand-hewn rock of the tunnel entrance right off the Richardson Highway. It stands as a quiet monument to the ambition and grit of the miners and laborers who tried to carve a path through these granite walls.

When you stand by the Lowe River photographing the falls, it’s worth taking a moment to look at the old route and imagine the sheer effort it took to build in this vertical landscape.

Safe travels