Trifter

The Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania is a 50 mile long gorge carved out by the Pine Creek River in North Central Pennsylvania. At its deepest point the Pine Creek Gorge is 1,450 feet deep and nearly one mile wide.

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The Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania begins just south of Ansonia and passes through two Pennsylvania state parks on each side of the canyon.

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On the east rim of the canyon is Leonard Harrison Park (above) and on the west rim is Colton Point Park (below).

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Both parks have trails along the canyon that offer spectacular views and waterfalls from Pine Creek tributaries as they fall into the gorge.

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The Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania started forming some 20,000 years ago at the end of the last glacial era. The Pine Creek used to flow in a northeast direction but at the end of the last glacial era the the Laurentide Continental Glacier, which covered most of northern North America, dammed up Pine Creek and formed a lake around present day Ansonia. As the glacier melted it overflowed the dam on the opposite side and reversed Pine Creek to its present day southerly flow and as the glacier continued to melt the heavy flow down Pine Creek started carving the Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania. Thousands of years of erosion from Pine Creek have brought the gorge to its present look.

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In the two parks the canyon walls average some 800 feet in height and the walls are as far apart as 4,000 feet. In addition to the rim trails, there are trails that lead to the bottom of the gorge where a bike path has replaced old train tracks through the canyon.

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Leonard Harrison State Park can be reached along PA 660 about 10 miles west of Wellsboro, while Colton Point State Park is five miles south of US 6 at Ansonia on Colton Road.

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You can read about the Grand Canyon of the East here.  For more beautiful Pennsylvania state parks see Beautiful Waterfalls of Ricketts Glen, Hyner View State Park, Hickory Run: Land of Boulders and Ohiopyle Waterfalls.