More Waterfalls

Wednesday, September 9, 2015

We have a big day planned today, three state parks and a national monument; and Mother Nature is cooperating.  It is a cool, but beautiful sunny morning.  All three parks have waterfalls to see.

The first is Cascade Falls, which lies about 15 miles southwest of Grand Marais on the Cascade River.  A note on geography here.  The North Shore Highway 61 runs northeast toward Thunder Bay and southwest toward Duluth.   The Cascade Falls are so named because they are comprised of several smaller falls that cascade through the shallow gorge. 

The speed of the water down this river and over these falls make a deafening roar and is really impressive.  Next stop is at the Judge C.R. Magney State Park to see the Devils Kettle falls.  The trail to this bad boy is a mile long, the last 1000 feet involve 227 steps down toward the the Brule River and you know what that means, we have to climb back up those when we leave.  Think spaghetti legs!

These are the upper falls

The Devils Kettle is a really large falls and the lookout is some distance back.  The left falls plunge into what appears to be a pot hole and the falls on the right drops about 50 feet.  Click the picture to zoom in.  This falls is best viewed as a video.  We can’t upload due to the WiFi here; maybe we’ll be able to do it once back home.

All the water flowing down these rivers has lots of tannic acid due to the decomposing wood and vegetation.  This also creates a lot of foam below the falls due to the organic material in the water.

The last falls is on the Pigeon River, which today creates the U.S. Canadian border.  There is a little history here, so lets jump to the Grand Portage National Monument.  Recall an earlier post about Fort William?  Before Fort William, the Northwest Company use to hold their Rendezvous in Grand Portage.  The town got its name from an 8 mile portage to bypass the falls and rapids of the lower Pigeon River.

So, Grand Portage was the center for furs coming from the west and goods coming from Montreal in the latter 1700s.  The Northwest Company was a huge Canadian company and very profitable.  This area prospered with all the trade passing through, until the border was redrawn along the Pigeon River as a  result of the American Revolution.  NWC was now on US soil.  They moved to Fort William which is now called Thunder Bay.  There were a couple problems; first there weren’t many beaver left in Canada and second was the 8 mile grand portage route was no longer Canadian land and could not be used.  This essentially cut them off from use of the Pigeon River and therefore the west coast.

They used the Kaministiquia River, but it was much narrower and shallow compared to the Pigeon.  That translates into fewer and smaller canoes and less freight.  In 1821 NWC merged with Hudson Bay, but furs were no longer their main business staple.

The Ojibwa were badly impacted by all this.  They were the trappers and they had a close economic relationship with NWC.  After NWC moved, the Ojibwa lost their economic base and the US moved them to reservations.  So now we are trying to make amends.  The National Monument tells their story and Grand Portage is their town, as is the State Park.

At the National Monument, the site of the original fort is being preserved and may be reconstructed at some point.  A few buildings already have been.

This is the entrance to the grand portage as it exists today.  They told of several folks with canoes who are re-tracing the entire route from the Atlantic to the Pacific.

Visiting the state park gives you a look at one of the falls the grand portage helped to avoid.

Tomorrow is moving day as we head to Tettegouche State Park.