Meech Creek Valley covered bridge (1932) in Chelsea, Québec, Canada (Gatineau Park).
In my last post I showed some fall foliage I’d seen at Gatineau Park in Québec. Those images were from the southern part of Gatineau Park, so I thought with this post I’d show some of the scenes I found in the northeastern parts of the park. The fall foliage color wasn’t quite as pronounced here, but was still nice and as always adds a bit of color to a photograph that wouldn’t be quite the same with green leaves. This first photograph is the Meech Creek covered bridge in Chelsea, Québec, just within the eastern border of the park. Unlike a lot of the other covered bridges I photographed during my week in the east, this bridge doesn’t appear to have an official name and doesn’t have the year it was built posted on it. There is an information sign further up the road which indicated this bridge was built in 1932 as a Depression era make work project, but while it calls it the “Meech Creek Covered Bridge” it doesn’t appear to be as official a name as that given to some other covered bridges.
This old gravel road (Chemin Cafferty) is near the eastern edge of the park (near Autoroute 5) and eventually joins up with a trail called Cross Loop which heads to Lac Carman in Gatineau Park. I may have been standing in the exact same spot for this photo as the one below with the hay bales and the fall colours on the Gatineau hills behind. Either way, I think this photograph of the fall foliage and the gravel road disappearing into the forest – is one of my favourites of the whole trip. At least so far. The photo makes me want to walk through the trees and see what is around the corner.
On a hill just above Meech Creek and the covered bridge I saw these two men painting the bridge. An internet search reveals a lot of paintings of this bridge and the surrounding fields, so this appears to be a popular spot for painting (and photography). I’ve also seen several drone videos from the area. When I was photographing the bridge and the scenes around it there was a man flying a drone over the bridge and fields. I don’t know if it is legal to do so there, but it certainly seemed to annoy the painters! Drones seem like a lot of fun to fly and photograph with – but they certainly destroy the ambience of a nice quiet place like this one.
Painting the Meech Creek Covered Bridge
-click to enlarge-
For more of my photographs from Quebec visit my Québec Photos Collection.