NIAGARA'S FROZEN TUNDRA

Breathtaking winter vistas from one of Canada’s natural wonders

- John Busch, St. Thomas, Ont.

For the most part of my 70 years I’ve always lived within a four-hour drive of Niagara Falls and, as such, I have had many opportunities to visit this amazing place. From school trips, earning the funds to charter an Air Canada aircraft to fly over the falls, to our honeymoon, I have lost track of the number of times I have been to the area. I have also been under the falls through the tunnels, and I have, of course, been on the Maid of the Mist cruise. It seemed strange that the area of the cruise would now be covered with thick ice.

When I heard the gorge was frozen over during the winter, back in 2015, I decided to drive for two hours to the falls to see what kind of photo opportunities I could find. It was a cold day with light winds, a bit of sun with cloudy periods, ideal for photography. When we arrived at the falls, it was not what I expected.

We walked to where we always started our tour, the Horseshoe Falls. Nearly everything was white with the only exceptions being the sky and the odd flash of turquoise water around the ice, so it was nice to have the sun blocked periodically to give some contrast and shadow. Even the nearby trees had several inches of ice on the branches and trunks. We were able to get an unobstructed view of the falls and the gorge, as it was off season for tourists.