McGowan Falls

After all the rain of last week the rivers and waterfalls around here were running very high, so on Sunday afternoon Mrs. F.G. and I headed down to McGowan Falls in Durham.  It's the only falls that I can actually get close to in my wheelchair, and the only one on the Saugeen watershed draining west.  All the others around here are down a trail somewhere which makes them hard or impossible to get to for me.

This photo covers what you can see at the falls.  It's a low rocky shelving falls, together with a mill dam with the gates on the right.  McGowan was the original miller at this dam site.

The heavy flow of water over the gates was the most obvious thing I noticed, much much more than I have ever seen before.

The natural part of the falls is almost submerged in the heavy flow of water, but it's visible to the left.

And downstream, to the left, the river is flowing very heavy and fast!

Lots of chance to get photos of splashing water as it plunges down from the gates.

All the other waterfalls in the region drain north into Georgian Bay.  Because those rivers, the Beaver, Bighead, Sydenham, Pottawatomi and Indian Creek all fall over the Niagara Escarpment in places, waterfalls are plentiful (and spectacular).  This is the only waterfall I can think of on the entire Saugeen watershed, even though the five branches of that river drain a much larger area.

You even get a selfie today, well not exactly; it's really a portrait by Mrs. F.G.  Don't I look handsome!