Sunday, October 2, 2016

Log Barns

I'm going to stick in a few very old barn shots tonight, some log barns we saw on our drive to Ottawa a few weeks ago.  And today I was checking part of the Bruce Trail and passed my favourite old barn foundation too.

We don't see many log barns in Ontario, but we spotted these ones along the backwoods road from the west toward Renfrew, on our way to Ottawa.  It's poor farmland, and has never become prosperous for farming, but the settlers did clear land and establish farms.  This is obviously an old house in front of the barn.

And just to the left of those was this log barn, looking like it was still used a bit, at least for storage.  Interesting to see all the square notched corners on these, though the logs haven't been squared.

A short distance down the road was this combination collection, the main barn being log, but attached outbuildings that were frame.

To the right was a small cabin that looked in quite good shape, with squared logs and chinking still in place, perhaps a former cabin..

But on the other side another barn had lost its roof entirely, and was looking in much worse condition.  We saw a number of other less photogenic log barns on our drive west from Renfrew, certainly more than I've ever seen around here.

But this favourite barn foundation is just down the road.  Perched on the slope of the Niagara Escarpment, it's not far off the Bruce Trail, and today it's buried in the woods.  The barn here was dismantled and moved, probably in the 1920's or 30's.

It's an open three-sided barn foundation; the 4th side faces east (our of the wind and into the morning sun), and would have been an open overhang on posts for the cattle to shelter under.  I'm always amazed at the workmanship of this barn, the big limestone and schist blocks on the outside all cut to square sides.

The inside was not nearly so carefully done, with field stones mortared in place.  But it has held up well for being built probably 140 years ago, and exposed to the rain, snow and frost for the past 70 years or so.

I tried a panorama shot on my iphone to show the open three-sided foundation, though you need to use your imagination as it does distort it a bit.  I could stand in the centre and look out and picture the view over the valley that must have been here in the 1930's, all open farm fields, though now it's all forest and no view at all.

Joining 

17 comments:

  1. Beautiful barns, but a sad tale of settlers who tried to make a living on land that couldn't support them. There's an abundance of areas like that, often within sight of prosperous farms on better soils.

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  2. Those early people had such a hard life, and miles away from anywhere that would supply them with basic food needs that they could not grow themselves. Those stones, placed so well to last all these years.

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  3. Incredible logs and rock foundation. Great post!

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  4. Nice shots of the old barns.
    Great old stone foundation.

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  5. Cool to discover some old barns! Thanks for sharing your photos.

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  6. I like seeing old places like these. Thanks for sharing.

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  7. Love the old barns and buildings really gets your imagination going wondering about life back then.

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  8. Nice shots! I love old barns. It's such a terrific photography theme.

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  9. I enjoy looking at remnants still standing a century or more later, thinking about what it must have been. Thanks for the great pictures and commentary. :-)

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  10. Thanks for sharing this week, you have been missed. I hope that you will visit again.

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  11. Ah, the stories those old barns could tell!

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  12. What charming shots of the barns.

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  13. When we drive from to the east side of Algonquin Park along Hwy 60 we see a lot of these old log barns in the Ottawa Valley too. They do have such weathered charm and history about them. You got some great shots of them. There's an old barn foundation along the lakeshore here that I like to visit on my walks. There is still a silo, and you can still see what I think are stalls for the cows.
    Wendy

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  14. Those really are great old barns!

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  15. I do like those photo's showing the old barns.

    All the best Jan

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  16. I always love seeing old barns and their foundations of stone. I noticed a number of those log barns have steel/tin roofs on them and that for sure has saved the barns from the elements all these years so far.

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  17. The old foundation is quite a sight to see. A lot of the farmland in the upper Ottawa Valley's not really good for much more than grazing land. Crops don't really do well.

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