If you’re in Wyoming and exploring the area, check out Garden Creek Falls in Casper! It’s a beautiful place to hike and take photos
One of my favorite summer activities is exploring our area a bit and finding new places to hike when we travel around Wyoming and our closely neighboring state, South Dakota. I love adding them to the blog for you to check out if you’re ever in the area!
Wyoming is a pretty amazing place, but I might be biased a bit since I’ve lived here nearly my entire life 😉 Last weekend I worked one of the aid stations for a local gravel grinder and got to meet some pretty amazing athletes from Wyoming and neighboring states!
The weekend before that, we went to the Smoking Guns match in Casper, Wyoming, and the kids and I took a little time to explore. I’ve been to Casper countless times throughout my life, but I’ve never checked out the hiking areas there, so I looked up some hiking trails and found Garden Creek Falls in Rotary Park in the foothills of Casper Mountain. It’s a beautiful area!
We actually went to see Garden Creek Falls two days in a row: the first day we went, we hiked around and I realized that my Canon camera battery was completely dead when we got there.
Fortunately, we had some family coming down to visit, so I had them bring my camera battery charger with them, so I was able to go back to the falls the following morning to get some better photos. So some of these photos are taken with my Canon, and some of these are taken with my iPhone since I forgot to check my camera battery before we left the house haha. Lesson learned for next time.
I still haven’t learned how to take great waterfall photos with slow shutter speed to make them look more flowy, and I just ordered a polarizing filter for those water and creek shots (should come in the mail next week!), so bear with my ammature waterfall photos 😉
We saw plenty of wild flowers, I got to try out some macro photography with my zoom lens. Something I still need to work on, but it’s so satisfying to see the results!
Garden Creek Falls, Casper WY
Getting to the waterfall itself is super easy and accessible for anyone, even people with strollers and disabilities. But getting to the upper observation decks for the waterfall farther up the canyon walls is steep and strenuous when you’re taking the trail to the left while facing the waterfall (there are some loose fences up there to help on the steepest areas).
Once we got to the top of the canyon, it wasn’t too steep after that, but there are drop offs down the canyon that you’ll want to watch out for. If you take small kids and pets, make sure they can stay on the trail!
We made a loop up the trail to the observation decks, above the falls, and down around the part of the West Loop back to the parking lot. Our loop was short (probably only 1.3 miles), but it was good.
There are 2 parking lots at the Rotary Park trails, we parked at the first parking lot we came to and hiked a bit farther to Garden Creek Falls. There are places to picnic at the park, but no camping spots here.
Check out other places to see and hiking in Wyoming, the Black Hills, and Montana:
- Garden Creek Falls, Casper, WY
- Crow Peak, Spearfish
- Ayres Natural Bridge
- Community Caves (Wildcat Caverns), Spearfish, SD
- The M Trail Missoula
- Devil’s Bathtub, Spearfish Canyon
- Crazy Horse Volksmarch
- Red Beds Trail, Devil’s Tower
- Trail End Museum, Sheridan
- Koltiska Pumpkin Patch, Sheridan
Our hiking essentials for longer hikes:
- Camelbak hydration pack (I’m not sure that the one I use is for sale anymore, mine is a small one that works perfect for short hikes and bike rides)
- Takeya water bottle
- SPI belt
- Natural bug repellent
Sarah Jane Parker is the founder, recipe creator, and photographer behind The Fit Cookie. She’s a food allergy mom and healthy living blogger based in Wyoming. Sarah is also an ACSM Certified Personal Trainer, ACE Certified Health Coach, Revolution Running certified running coach, and an ACE Certified Fitness Nutrition Specialist