Reversing Falls Rapids

The reversing falls are a phenomenon worth seeing. 

The St. John River enters into the Bay of Fundy in Saint John.  It’s a very wide river up in Fredericton and in Saint John it funnels through a narrow gorge with a series of rapids and falls into the Bay.  What’s amazing is that with the powerful tides on the Bay of Fundy, the river water is pushed backwards up the falls.  To get a full appreciation of the scene, you need to see the river both at low tide and high tide. 

The St. John River rapids at low tide. At high tide they are going the other way.

We were lucky enough to get a window seat at the Fallsview Restaurant and we saw the river at all three stages:  low, slack and high tide. As we ate our meal, the fog rolled in and it was difficult to see what was happening below.  We needed to take another look on another day.

At first it was low tide and the water was rushing out to sea. As the time passed you could see the rapids changing and the water slowly rising.  

Halfway to the high tide there is a period of about 20 minutes where the water is level, neither going out or coming in.  It’s called slack tide.  There are no rapids on the water and boats can sail without danger.  Once the tide has risen further, the water is pushed upstream until high tide.  Then the tide goes out and the cycle begins again.  It’s approximately another 12 hours until the next high tide.

The river is running downstream (to the right) and the tide is rising.

The slack tide is just ending and there is a ripple of river running to the left, upstream.