Clifton Gorge is such an amazing place and seems so unlikely that in many places you can walk right up to the cliffs of the gorge before realizing it is there. It seems that at the end of the last ice age the headwaters of the Little Miami flowed comparatively gently thru glacial drift below the retreating glaciers until they encountered the solid rock of the gorge. The water then cut deeper and deeper into the resistant Silurian dolomite bedrock until at the upper reaches of the gorge the cliff walls are barely 25 to 40 feet apart and it must be 75 to a 100 feet down to the water. Due to the fact its reasonably flat right up until you step off into space it's allmost impossible to convey in a photograph the scale of the gorge. All the photos I've seen online do no better than my poor attempts, trust me this is one place that is a hundred times more impressive in person. In this stretch the normally knee to waist deep upper little miami rages along between the cliff walls at an average depth of 34 feet. The river here drops at a powerfull rate of 35 feet per mile. Just downstream in John Bryan State park the rock is slightly softer and the gorge opens to a quarter mile or so but still retains impressive cliffs
Darnell's leap: In January 1778, Daniel Boone and his party of 28 were captured by the Shawnees.Cornelius Darnell was able to escape and with Shawnee in hot pursuit Darnell lept across the twenty five foot gap between the cliffs to freedom. Of course he could not make the entire leap but branches hung out over the 80 foot drop and Darnell went crashing across into them finally getting a firm grip on one as he fell and climbing up the cliff to safety! It makes me uneasy here to lean out over the safe rail of the overlook I cannot begin to imagine the courage it took to even attempt the leap.
The setting of the "The Blue Hole" a painting by Robert Duncanson in 1851 that now hangs in the Cincinnati Art Museum.
A huge piece of the cliff that has in the dim past broken loose and now creates its own three story island called "the steamboat" because, well, it's as big as a steamboat.
Below Clifton gorge the trails enter John Bryan State park. The two parks are really separated only by name as they fit seamlessly togethor and you cannot tell walking the river when you cross the boundary. Here the rock is slightly softer and the gorge opens to a quarter mile or so but still retains impressive cliffs
John Bryan purchased, in 1896, 335 acres along the Clifton gorge area and called these acres "Riverside Farm." The Cincinnati-Pittsburgh stagecoach road served the area and settlers began establishing water-powered industries such as a textile mill, grist mills and sawmills in the gorge.
After the turn of the century water power was no longer as economical as electricity and the industries in the rugged gorge closed. At the top of the gorge in Clifton the only surviving mill still is in operation and is famous for its Christmas light displays, one of the best in the state.
John Bryan gave Riverside Farm to the state of Ohio in 1918, "...to be cultivated by the state as a forestry, botanic and wildlife reserve park and experiment station," which would bear his name.John Bryans park and Clifton gorge have been designated as a National Natural Landmark by the U.S. Department of the Interior.
Over 340 types of wildflowers and 100 plus species of trees and shrubs are found in John Bryan State park. The cool gorge has created an "island" that has enabled plants usually found much further north to survive after the last ice age.In the gorge are found two quite rare plants—Ground Hemlock (Taxus canadensis), found nowwhere else in the county,and Asplenium ruta-muraria, found nowhere else in the State
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