My son, wife and 9 month old daughter stayed there last night. He gave two thumbs up for it.
http://www.lasr.net/pages/park.php?Park_ID=NE06sp001
Smith Falls, 15 miles east of Valentine off US-83, is such a scenic natural wonder. Created where a small, spring-fed creek tumbles about 70 feet over a rock ledge to the Niobrara Valley below, it is Nebraska's highest waterfall. During the last two decades, canoeists have discovered the Niobrara River and Smith Falls, but Nebraska's highest waterfall remained largely unseen by the general public until 1996 when an old historic bridge was refurbished and placed across the river allowing foot access to the falls. Before, access was only by canoe or an old hand powered cable car. Surprisingly, only one other of the state's waterfalls is found on public land, the nearby Fort Falls on the Fort Niobrara Wildlife Refuge.
Smith Falls is more than just a touris attraction, it is a naturally occurring biological museum. As the last glacier retreated north some 12,000 years ago, Nebraska's climate turned warmer and drier. Spruce and birch forest, which once covered the state, could not survive in this new climate and was replaced by prairie, except in the cool, wet canyons which feed into the Niobrara River east of Valentine. In these spring-branch canyons, remnants of the Ice Age fauna and flora persist. Protected from desiccating summer winds in the north-facing canyons, paper birch communities with an understory of northern grasses, sedges and forbs still thrive, 200 to 400 miles south of their modern-day range. At the foot of Smith Falls is a colony of unique trees, a hybrid of quaking aspen, a northern species, and big-toothed aspen, an eastern species.
We intend to go see it this summer if possible.