Waterfall Wednesday: Cowshed Falls

Cowshed Falls is part of Fillmore Glen State Park in Moravia, New York at the base of Owasco Lake. There is a separate short trail (about 100 yards) that leads directly to the bottom of Cowshed Falls within the park. Another trail leads up to the top of the falls and along the rest of the gorge (we’ll explore that later on with Bridge 7 Falls). The park has picnic areas, ballfields, a playground, and camping.

Cowshed Falls is about 37 feet tall. Similar to many other waterfalls in the region – such as when I shared about Carpenter Falls – Cowshed Falls has a capstone of Tully Limestone. It is rumored that Cowshed Falls gained its name due to cows that used to huddle under the capstone during stormy weather (this was many many years before the state park existed).

My First Visit

My first visit to Fillmore Glen State Park (and the one my reference photo for the painting was taken during) was early last fall and the leaves were just starting to turn their beautiful colors. I stopped by quickly on my way to see performance painter David Garibaldi in Auburn, New York. If you haven’t heard of him and seen his work, you should definitely go look him up.

Somehow I managed to misread the date of the show, so when I showed up to the venue, the parking lot was empty and the doors were locked. I try to let things like that make me laugh and look at the bright side. I had never been to downtown Auburn before, so at least I now knew how to get there and where I was going (and I had time to check out the park beforehand).

On the correct night, I was able to seamlessly find the theater and enjoy the show. This was my second time seeing David Garibaldi perform in person. The first time was at Corning Community College in 2013 during his college tour. Both were very inspiring shows and it’s amazing what he can create in less than 10 minutes! He combines painting, music, movement with a positive message towards impacting the world. He has now raised over $4 million dollars for charity with his art.

As if that’s not reason enough to like him, he also shows great love for his local neighborhood and is highly involved in building up Sacramento, California into a flourishing community. Definitely so many things to aspire to!

<Insert awkward segue.> In the spirit of love for local, appreciating and supporting the beautiful things around us, Fillmore Glen State Park is a beautiful nearby park to visit. The small park entrance fees collected go towards maintaining and preserving our beautiful state parks.

Painting It

Looking back, I think Cowshed Falls was one of my favorite waterfalls to paint. It was such a fun challenge to play with the different textures within the scene. There were lots of different rocks – large dry boulders to frame the painting, rocks covered with water making them dark and slippery, and rock walls covered with algae.

This Friday!

Cowshed Falls is one of the paintings that is on display in the Waterfalls of the Finger Lakes show that opened this week at the Corning branch of First Heritage Federal Credit Union (23 W Market Street)! The opening reception is coming up this Friday September 28th at 5-8pm during the Urban Arts Crawl! Send me a message if you’d like one of the postcards for the show, I have plenty still. Don’t forget to snap a picture when you visit the show and tag me @LauraJaenArt or #LauraJaenArt on social media. This helps others to be able to see and know about it also.