Friday, October 25, 2013
The Gorge at Watkins Glen
Watkins Glen State Park is located outside the village of Watkins Glen, New York, south of Seneca Lake in Schuyler County in the Finger Lakes region.
The centerpiece of the park is a 400-foot-deep (120 m) narrow gorge cut through rock by a stream – Glen Creek – that was left hanging when glaciers of the Ice age deepened the Seneca valley, increasing the tributary stream gradient to create rapids and waterfalls wherever there were layers of hard rock.
The park features three trails – open mid-May to early November – by which one can climb or descend the gorge. The Southern Rim and Indian Trails run along the wooded rim of the gorge, while the Gorge Trail is closest to the stream and runs over, under and along the park’s 19 waterfalls by way of stone bridges and more than 800 stone steps. The trails connect to the Finger Lakes Trail, an 800-mile (1280 km) system of trails throughout New York state.
You can find more visitor information at the official park website.
The beautiful capture above was taken by Peter Rivera who explains in his Flickr photo description:
“Shooting with shutter speeds of about 2 seconds I used a stone wall as a brace for this one. I walked through the gorge twice with my young son Simon, once for reconnaissance and then another pass for the shots I wanted. A cloudy day allowed me to slow the shutter down with a polarizer on the lens.”
