The most beautiful waterfalls in the UK
We love exploring lesser-known spoils on our home turf during summer. Turning our backs on TLC’s advice, we’ve searched high and low across the UK to find the country’s most spectacular waterfalls. Read on to discover cascading waters hidden among Bronze Age ruins in the foothills of Wales’ Carneddau mountains, a fairy-tale landscape in Cornwall where crystal-clear water trickles down between rocky ridges covered in emerald-coloured moss and an eerie fissure known as Devil’s Kitchen, where sputtering water and puffs of steam spew out of a black crack in the cliffs.
Getty ImagesOne of England’s highest waterfalls, High Force plunges 70ft down a precipice into the River Tees in the North Pennines, an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.
Getty ImagesOn the north coast of Jersey, the largest Channel Island, water trickles down a gap in the rocks of Plemont cove’s dark, craggy caves.
Getty ImagesKnown to puff plumes of steam, Devil’s Kitchen is a suitably eerie name for the black crack splitting through the Clogwyn y Geifr cliffs. Also known as Cwm Idwal waterfall, it flows from the fissure among the mountainous landscape in Wales’ oldest national nature reserve.
Getty ImagesCrystal-clear waters tumble over rocks at the Fairy Pools near Glenbrittle on the Isle of Skye, where brave adventurers travel to jump into icy pools.
Getty ImagesSurrounded by thick woodland, a pathway cut into the cliffs leads hikers past waterfalls and along the river gorge in Glenariff Nature Reserve and Forest Park in Northern Ireland’s Co. Antrim.
Getty ImagesScotland’s Falls of Glomach is one of the UK’s highest waterfalls at 370ft tall – reaching the top involves a five-mile trek through the remote Ross-shire countryside.
Getty ImagesMore reminiscent of tropical rainforests than Welsh countryside with its foaming white waters cascading down black rock draped in lush greenery and mossy crags, Pistyll Rhaeadr is one of the Seven Wonders of Wales.
Getty ImagesThe Kilt Rock (named after the pleats in the basalt rocks said to resemble a Scottish kilt) and Mealt Falls drop dramatically into the sea, just north of Portree on the Isle of Skye's Trotternish Peninsula.
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ShutterstockOne of the deepest underground chambers in Britain, this dark pothole stretches 322ft into the earth. Water from Fell Beck stream showers into the Gaping Gill caves, holding the record for the highest unbroken waterfall in England.
Getty ImagesThe Steall Waterslide trickles down Scotland’s highest munro Ben Nevis, weaving between towering pine trees, rusty-coloured ferns and heather-topped hills.
Getty ImagesEngland’s largest single-drop waterfall, Hardraw Force is as powerful as its name suggests. Hidden beyond a gushing river behind the Green Dragon Inn in the Yorkshire Dales, it has been known to turn into a giant frozen icicle in the colder months.
Getty ImagesLike something out of a fairy tale, a blanket of emerald-coloured moss covers rocky ridges in this corner of north Cornwall. The delicate stream of St Nectan's Kieve spills between cracks before coming to rest in a clear pool, surrounded by the wooded St Nectan’s Glen.
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Getty ImagesOne of the best known in Wales’s Waterfall Country, Henrhyd Falls plunges over a series of sandstone rocks into the steep, forested valley of Graig Llech Woods.
Getty ImagesJust beyond the village of Glenoe among the glens of Northern Ireland’s County Antrim, Glenoe waterfall gushes beneath a canopy of leafy trees.
Getty ImagesAber Falls cascades to the foothills of the Carneddau mountain range in Snowdonia, Wales, where remnants of Bronze Age settlements include excavated roundhouses, smithies, standing stones and cairns.
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