Hotels near Kennedy Falls and the Big Cedar

Ten kilometres return with only 150 m of elevation gain sounds gentle on paper. Kennedy Falls is not. Budget 5 to 6 hours for the round trip from the Mount Fromme parking lot on Mountain Highway, because the trail is a rugged obstacle course of exposed roots, ankle-deep mud, slippery creek crossings and blowdown you climb over or crawl under. Difficulty reads moderate in the guidebooks and feels harder than that underfoot. Start from a lower street-parking spot and the gain climbs to about 300 m.

Two payoffs sit at the far end. The first is an old-growth western red cedar roughly 600 years old with younger trees growing straight out of its trunk; erosion is now undercutting it, so stay well back from the base. The second is Kennedy Falls, a tiered cascade of roughly 30 m dropping into a rock amphitheatre on Kennedy Creek that almost nobody else is looking at on a weekday. There is no fee, no gate and no day-use pass, and the only facilities are the outhouses at the trailhead.

Pro Tip: Wear boots you are willing to write off and pack spare socks in a dry bag, because the mud between the halfway mark and Kennedy Creek does not drain even in August. Check for seasonal closures before you drive up: the District of North Vancouver has shut this trail in early November for hazard-tree removal after the Hemlock Looper outbreak.