I woke up to a beautiful red sky this morning:

(I know, sailor’s warning and all that). Another shot out one of Ed and Wilma’s windows a little later:

Ed drove me back to the Confederation Park where we had left off yesterday. He brought along his bike and walked it part of the way with me, with the intention of riding back to his car later. It was great to have him along and his knowledge of the area enhanced the enjoyment.

Remember the series of electric towers yesterday leading up to the skyway? We reached them here:

Aesthetically they ugly, but Ed said that a study had revealed that it would be too expensive to put the lines underground. All along this path were cottages looking out to the lake:

This is an active rescue boat station; we weren’t sure where the boat was today:

More cottages:

and a view looking backward:

Soon the Burlington Skyway and the lift bridge loomed:

The lift bridge was fascinating; here are some details:

These two bridges, the skyway and the lift bridge, allow ships to pass from the eastern end of Lake Ontario into Hamilton Harbor (or Burlington Bay, depending on your point of view). This is the narrow channel that separates them, first looking out to the lake:

and then looking into the harbor, under the lift bridge:

We used these “bike-friendly” stairs to ascend to the road level of the bridge:

Here are a couple of shots as we crossed the bridge:

The path continued on the other side of the bridge, now in Burlington:

There were continual views of the lake on our right:

The single row of cottages on our left between the path and the road are the subject of a current political battle. There is an attempt to remove them to claim the land for the park. This happened quite disastrously in the 70s in Hamilton (where we had just been on the other side of the bridge) and the fight is only now coming to Burlington. One cottage owner was particularly vociferous:

We had now traversed the entire west end of the lake and were just about lined up for the long due-east path to Toronto:

The first little section of that path:

A naval war memorial:

and in case you don’t recognize the two center flags:

Canada geese heading back to the Burlington Skyway:

About this time, Ed said his good-byes and got on his bike for the trip back to our starting point. Sometime soon I hope to visit him again with my wife and walk some of the trails around his house.

For a little while the path continued through the town:

The couple you see walking toward me in that last picture are Brian and Chris:

Brian caught my eye as we passed so I stopped and explained what I was doing. I never get tired of explaining my trip to people. Brian and Chris have a number of good options for walking around this area.

Google maps put me on a long, straight stretch at this point, about a quarter mile north of Lakeshore Drive. I should just have walked back to Lakeshore because it was pretty boring, punctuated by occasional glances down pretty side streets:

Near the end of this stretch I crossed the Bronte River and there was this nice opportunity in the middle of the bridge to rest and contemplate:

Here’s the view from the bench:

One block later a car pulled into the driveway in front of me and when I saw “Van Harten” on the side of it, I thought — what a coincidence, since my brother works for Van Harten. Of course, it WAS my brother, Jonathan, who, just like his son and daughter-in-law, Jordan and Stacey, had tracked me down using the SIGHTINGS tab on this blog. He is a surveyor and works all over the region. Today he happened to be in Oakville and so decided to look me up! (I was in Oakville by this time.)

Needless to say I was absolutely delighted. I was within two miles of my final destination for the day, Coronation Park, so he offered to buy me a tea and meet me there. I hoofed it there as quickly as I could, but while still trying to enjoy the scenery.

Walking back toward the lake:

Is this a warning about the geese themselves or the mess they leave on the sidewalks?

Vista opening out to the lake again:

Now walking parallel to the lake:

Some fine painted wrought-iron railings on these houses:

I now reached a section of the path along the lake that was exquisite:

There is still lots of color around here; “lake effect” weather affects the south side of the lake, but on the north side the temperature is moderated by the lake so that it is warmer in the fall:

When I turned into the park Jonathan was waiting for me with hot tea from Tim Horton’s (of course) and we made our way to a gazebo in the park just in time to avoid the rain that was just starting up. We met this man, John, who was a serious collector of debris discoverable by metal detector:

He was a pretty interesting fellow, having served for a time in the Canadian Merchant Marines, for example.

At one point I took this picture of the Toronto skyline, looming ever larger on the horizon:

John took a picture of me with Jonathan:

and then shortly after that Phil arrived to pick me up for my night’s lodging. What a great treat to have been able to meet up with Jonathan!

Phil is connected to me in several ways (at least three) and he and his wife Marilyn are very good friends with Dean and Barb, who I stayed with two nights ago. Here is a picture of Phil and his wife Marilyn:

It would be impossible in this small space to list all the ways that Phil and Marilyn have significantly touched the lives of others over the years, both in Canada and around the world. I just wouldn’t be able to do justice to their wonderful lives of service. It was great to spend time with them and they were very gracious to me, in spite of being exhausted because of recent activities. We stayed up later than we should have, talking.

As promised, here is a picture of Dean and Barb:

I’m sure the superlatives I have used in describing the people I’m meeting are wearing thin from overuse. But I continue to be amazed at the good these people are doing in the world. One thing that Dean and Barb have been involved with extensively in recent years is a small group that finds foster care for children, working in conjunction with the government. This involves a great deal of ongoing interaction with the children and the foster parents. It takes much love to do work like this.

Today I had another traveling companion. Here is the hand-off picture in Dean and Barb’s driveway:

From the right: Dean, Barb, Wilma and Ed. Wilma and Ed are Dutch; the connection to me is that their daughter Kim roomed with Starr, the wife of my son Matthew, to whose house I’m heading. Wilma dropped off Ed and took my bin and stroller in her car, leaving me with just my backpack and a few small items for the day. Sometime ago Ed had suggested walking with me for a day, so we made good on this plan today. We had a good time getting to know each other throughout the day.

One of the several careers that Ed has had, his latest, is his heavy involvement in the Ontario Christian Gleaners, a non-profit company that collects vegetables that are about to be discarded by farms or large grocery chains, but which are still perfectly edible. They then chop them up, dehydrate them, and package them for organizations that give out food to the needy. This is a free service and the operation is supported entirely by donations.

Ed was a fine companion as he is very fit, having hiked the entire Bruce Traile, cycled across the entire USA, and cycled a large part of Japan. He is soon leaving for another major cycling trip in Argentina and Chile.

We got going today by making our way out to Highway 81 (or 8 as it used to be called) and heading west, parallel to the lake edge but still some distance from it. Always on our left were views of the Niagara Escarpment:

and on our right was the lake, with the QEW between us and the lake.
I continue to be surprised how much color there still is in this region:

Here’s a view along the sidewalk we were traversing:

Eventually we turned north to cross to cross the QEW:

You can make out a little piece of the QEW in the center of the picture and a little view of the lake to the right. Here’s the QEW as we passed overhead; I’ve driven this road many, many times:

The strip between the QEW and the lake is fairly narrow, but wide enough to support housing and at one point, this cluster of eight significant antennas:

The housing is mostly town houses; here are some finished ones and some under construction:

At one point we passed actual construction of concrete foundations, using a conveyor belt system that I hadn’t seen before, being fed by two trucks simultaneously:

What we were looking for was the Waterfront Trail, so we were encouraged to see:

Unfortunately, there were times that the QEW came so close to the lake that the only walking option was a road that parallels the QEW for much of its length, the North Service Road. This was very noisy, though this section was a little better:

but not this section:

Occasionally we got tantalizing peeks of the lake to our right:

Ed was a great guide as he knew this area pretty well. This little section used to be wetlands; the developers managed to get permission to build here by letting the lake in a bit and making a place where homeowners could dock; this made the houses considerably more expensive!

Here’s my doughty, Dutch crony, right at the edge of the lake:

Looking to the left, we would like to have walked along the lake here but it was deemed private property by these residences and gated off:

so it was out to the North Service Road again:

Eventually, however, we managed to find the entrance to Confederation Park:

This stretch along the lake apparently used to be in a terrible, run-down state. It turns out that Ed, in an earlier career was part of the crew that was responsible for restoring the park to its current beautiful state:

There were places to walk right to the shore of the lake:

and opportunities to sit and contemplate:

Here is a tantalizing documentary picture showing a good part of tomorrow’s walk. You can see the Burlington Skyway near the center of the picture and the lift bridge to its right that I will be navigating:

Who knew the place was so dangerous?

Here is a lovely gaggle of willows (anyone know the correct collective?):

Just prior to stopping for the day I had a little staring contest with some gulls:

And to the left in this last picture is the little restaurant where we rested for a few minutes until Wilma arrived with the car, in which we scooted back to Ed and Wilma’s large, hospitable home and enjoyed some sweet fellowship.