Recently the team visited a beautiful set of rapids and falls along the East river on the trail leading to Castle Rock, Lunenburg County. Here are two impressions.
Cloud Forest
By Doug Pope
Driving to the site, my mind drifted onto a news story from the night before. A report on the Hajj—pilgrimage to Mecca—this July, first since the Covid lock-downs. Two million visitors pouring into the holy city all at once, while temperatures in Saudi Arabia soared to 48 degrees C. Here in Nova Scotia, it was barely 20 degrees and entering a second week of rain. Fogbound towards East River and Barry’s Brook. Not ideal weather for a hike! Tegan, who was driving, asked if I knew what a cloud forest was? No, I said, what is it? It’s a mountainous rain forest continually shrouded in fog, mist and cloud, she said.
We met the others and started on the trail, soon leaving the damp gravel path for the sodden forest floor. Everywhere we turned there was water. Wash-outs, ponds, and streams accosted us on all sides. We crossed a broken bridge, through more sodden woods, nearing a roar of rushing water.
The falls were a modest and glorious affair. Water sped over a chaotic cluster of erratics—spilling into the fern forest in three directions. We used a rope line to balance beam our way to a second falls. The logs could not have been more slippery!
All safely across, we looked at the two falls and the strip of land between and wondered: was it an island in the midst of a single river or two rivers divided? Only one way to find out. We fought our way upstream. The water was too loud for conversation so we rock-hopped and balance-beamed and ducked beneath branches. Then came the answer: one river. We were perched on an island, inches above a falls. It wasn’t raining, but you could tell, this place was rarely dry. Cloud forest Nova Scotia.
Misty Falls
By Lenka Tomlinson
By East River and Barry’s Brook the team found themselves this past Wednesday, after days of foggy weather in Nova Scotia, with no sign of letting up – we decided to make the most of it.
Passing by a noisy factory- where thousands of trees are converted into compressed construction material, the sweet smell of softwood and chemicals wafted through the air. With a mild South-Easterly breeze, the noise and smell follow us as we hike along the East River Trail. Along patches of previously developed land, foundations gather moss, reclaimed after decades by nature once again.
The weather is bleak – heavy fog, and wet all around. From the middle of the forest we hear the rush of water from a series of rapids and waterfalls. Following the sound, we find ropes atop slippery wet logs that aid us as we traverse into the water system.
We cross mossy rocks and boulders, and hike along the wide river, up to the rapids. There are tight squeezes and slight tumbles but we all make it up to a giant nest of rocks to sit upon. We take our time here to admire the natural beauty. The urge to identify surrounding species tests our collective knowledge: toad’s skin lichen, rock tripe, British soldier and pixie cup, turkey tail and bracket fungus, witches’ hair and lungwort, as well as many types of moss.
A few species look alike, such as the tiny British soldier lichen and red-tipped pixie cup. Closer inspection reveals the former has twisting branches while the latter is straight and single-stalked like a miniature match stick.
Taking photos of the unique species, I discover a grasshopper crystalized in sticky, slowly-running sap from a coniferous tree. It makes me think of fossils preserved in amber.
On our way out, we are more confident and pass the trunk bridges with roped assists with ease. Continuing back into the park, the fog starts to lift. The main trail has become far more populated. We greet families walking their dogs, brisk morning walkers, kids running ahead of wheeled strollers–we’ve entered a different universe from the rush of the rapids and isolation of the misty waterfall.