Hi Vartkes. I am a long-time lurker and a relatively new forum member here, also located in Niagara (near Pelham and Shorthills Provincial Park). Niagara has many, many good photographic opportunities if you are a rural-lifestyle, nature or a festival-type photographer. No, it's not the Tetons, but there is a very good variety of quite dramatic albiet smaller scale landscapes.
As I inferred, one of the best areas to visit is the Shorthills Provincial Park, which lies in a big gash in the Niagara Escarpment face created by the now-extinct Erigan River. This extinct river actually predated the Niagara River and Niagara Falls several ice ages ago before it was jammed with gravel and sand deposits in one of the melt eras. I have been hiking this rugged zone for years mapping the old escarpment walls, small waterfalls (25 in one two kilometer stretch of the east wall alone) and shooting the many deer, coyotes, and birds that make their home here.
One of the best things you can do as a photographer in Niagara is to join one of the three big local camera clubs at either Welland, St. Catharines or Niagara Falls. There are some great photographers in those three groups and a lot of friendly rivalry and competition occurs between them.
Leigh Daboll
