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148/365: Barron River Snake.

Last day on the Barron River. Today we left our packs in a car at the Squirrel Rapids access point, and continued downstream to Black Bay as a day trip (we had another car parked down there too). About half way we would have to portage around First Chute. This little fellow was sunning himself on the rocks a short distance upstream from that cataract. After the photographers circled around a few times I did my usual and simply jumped out of the canoe to get a closer shot without the wobble of the boat interfering in the photo. The snake posed for a few shots then left the area. 

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147/365: Barron Canyon.

This is it. This was what the whole trip was about … the infamous Barron Canyon of Algonquin Park. On Tuesday, we viewed this from the hiking trail up top, and today we paddled through the canyon itself. I will admit you get a far better appreciation of just how high those cliffs are from the top side, but that’s probably acrophobia talking there.  From the river, the canyon is a relaxing paddle on a near still river. There is quite the air of solitude and peace in here, and an overwhelming stillness to the area. 

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146/365: High Falls.

Day three of the Algonquin/Barron Canyon outing. We stayed on High Falls Lake after portaging in from St. Andrews Lake. Today we spent the day paddling around in “The Cascades” and the upper Barron River before returning to camp. Since “The Cascades” was not quite as impressive as the name implied, a few of us paddled over to High Falls (which drains Stratton Lake into High Falls Lake) around dusk. The trail is rather rugged and I can see why portaging this way is “not recommended”. Here’s a view of the falls from across the pool. There’s actually two waterfalls that drain into this pool, the other being off to the left (well, outside the camera view). 

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145/365: High Falls Slide.

Day two of the Barron Canyon trip. Today was mainly paddling across Grand Lake, Stratton Lake and St. Andrews Lake. It seemed we were paddling against the wind the entire way so the camera tended to stay inside it’s waterproof drybag for protection. Well, that and I’ve reached the point where I tend not to pull out the camera for “trees and water” pics that could be generic for any part of Algonquin. So, low photo day. Again, today’s photo is representative of the “highlight” of the day … here’s the “High Falls Slide”. We stopped here for a break from the paddling and frankly this is like a little amusement park in Algonquin. People are wearing their life jackets like little diapers to protect their rear end from the bumps along the way but you get the picture. Jump in the water and yell “weeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!” until splashdown, climb out, repeat. Great fun!

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144/365: Moonrise on Achray.

If you’re following this project, you might have noticed I stopped posting for a few days. The reason? I took a trip! We had a geocaching backcountry canoe trip through Algonquin’s Barron Canyon so I haven’t had any internet access. What I had was much, much better. Now, I did take photos from the top of the Canyon on the way in, but that would be the obvious photo to choose, wouldn’t it? So instead you’ll have to wait (or check out my Flickr stream) for the Canyon photos. Here, let me present you with the “view from my tent” on Grand Lake, on the first night of our trip at Achray campground. 

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143/365: Backcountry Recipe.
Pulled my MSR MiniWorks water filter out of storage for a trip to the backcountry. This is going to be my water supply for a few days so I an being extra careful to make sure nothing nasty is growing inside the filter. Standard cleaning procedure for the ceramic element is to boil it for 5 minutes. Today’s photo will also mark a pause in my photo posts until I return. I will be taking photos but won’t have Internet access for a while.

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142/365: Coiled Illumination.

Spotted this inside a store at the Walden Galleria in Buffalo, NY. It’s a coiled element incandescent light bulb, rather than the boring frost out all the details type. Guessing that children born today won’t event recognize what this device actually does in the future.

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141/365: Looking at Toronto, from Mississauga.

This is the view looking toward Toronto from J.C. Saddington Park on the Mississauga waterfront. I was travelling light today so the photo is from my little Fuji XP21. I took some time to sit on the pier with Kristen and relax while reading our Kindles. Getting a spot on the waterfront proved to be quite the challenge today as there was far more demand for parking spots on the lake than the parking spots that were available. I won’t be heading down here on a warm long weekend again any time soon!

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140/365 : Wild Columbine.

Spent the day hiking 30 kilometres on the Bruce Trail, starting at Duncan Caves and finishing at Hogg’s Falls in Grey County. Along the way we hiked up on top of Old Baldy and for the first part of the hike the wildflowers were all over the place. Carpets of Trilliums and hundreds of these little red flowers, called Wild Columbine. I mentioned to another hiker that I would love to get underneath one of these and take a photo with the petals backlit by the bright sun. Problem was, I was toting around a DSLR with a decent lens and that would be a little difficult to wedge under a 6 – 10” flowering plant that’s pointing down. I would need one that’s up a little higher, and that would have to be in a sunbeam as well. Five minutes later on the hike, my request was answered as we found a clump growing on a mossy boulder and hanging over the edge, and it was in a sunbeam. I still had to lay on the ground to get my photo and the other hiker took lots of photos of THAT pose too :). I had over 350 photos for the day, but this one is the one that took the most work so it’s the one I’m going with for the photo of day #140. 

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Trilliums on the Bruce Trail

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Trilliums on the Bruce Trail, originally uploaded by Gregory Pleau.

Joined in on a 30km hike from Duncan Caves to Hoggs Falls along the Bruce Trail. Along the way – particularly around Old Baldy – we saw a lot of wildflowers, mainly Trilliums, Lady Slippers and Wild Columbine. Here, I’ve found a pink trillium surrounded by white ones. The lighting was simply perfect and this is just cropped to 8×10, with a slight saturation bump from the RAW image.