When you are truly passionate about something people take notice. Everyone that you know, and some you don’t, supply you with more information about the subject of your heart and the knowledge and experience simply snowballs. A wonderful effect of passion, because each day brings something new. In planning my trip I decided a visit to my friends in Canada was a must on my schedule. Shortly after organizing the dates my friends told me of a place to visit that I simply couldn’t refuse. Nestled in the Ottawa Valley of Ontario laid in wait something I had yet to experience: My first Canadian cave.
Canada is a whole new animal for me, and this was my first visit. I was very excited about earning another stamp in my passport, but was disappointed to find that they don’t stamp it when you are crossing via vehicle. The universe didn’t seem to think that was vefry fitting for my picture-taking, thoroughly documenting ways of travel and I heard a loud shot as something hit my windshield only a few miles past the border. Something had slammed into my windshield (that I just recently replaced this year, I might add) creating a rather remarkable shape: A double “C” on the passenger side. My Jeep had, rather unfortunately, been branded with my trip to Canada.
All four of us (or rather 3 and a half since one was an adorable 2 year old) then headed into town where I was to partake of some local cusine before we headed to the caves. We dined at Odi’s King Burger in Renfrew, enjoying some Poutine. Poutine is a french dish, consisting of french fries covered in gravy and cheese. If you ask me, I think it was like a fried version of mashed potatoes and gravy. Delicious.
Bonnechere Cave is located north of Algonquin park and is located in fossil-abundant Ordovician limestone. The cave consists of passages, with no large rooms to speak of, and has very little ornamentation. I would place the very sparse speleothem development at less than 1%. This is quite obviously due to the nature of the cave since it has been mostly filled with rushing water in recent geologic times. The limestone of the cave may be older than some, but the constant rushing water that filled the caverns did not allow redeposition to occur in any large manner. The cave passageways are incredibly interesting. They very methodically follow prominant jointing in the cave’s home formation. It seems to be located all within the same formation, the limestone being all of the same type, but I have yet to complete the research to know which limestone this is.
The Bonnechere river roars past the cave and into one of the natural entrances carved by melting glacial waters. The entrance is best viewed from the other side of the river, where you can stand on the remnants of an old bridge. The water was pretty high today, this area of Canada suffering from the same high waters that much of America is suffering from this Spring.
My visit to this area of Canada was fantastic, especially since I was able to spend it with such wonderful and accomodating friends. Spending time with them and their son reminded me again how precious spending time with friends can be. I loved every minute of it, and it even made me think a second about having kids of my own. The passion of cave geology calls, however….someday in the distant future I suppose. For right now I have many great friends with cute kids to play with and enjoy (then send them back to their parents when they get grumpy! Ha ha!~)
Tomorrow I was to head off on my own again. I was going to miss spending time with my friends, but I had something pretty majestic to ease the pain: Niagara Falls. I’ll see you there, if I survive the barrel drop (j/k).
-Nicole
Awesome I hope you went to Tim Hortons it might help with what little sleep you get!