Bruce Trail End-to-End Part 5
This posting is quite late. It documents the hike that dairymilk, Minnie and I went on with J, J&M on June 5th. For this particular hike, we decided to knock off the start of the trail. Our route took us from Queenston Heights, kilometre zero, to about km 13, where the trail crosses the access road in the Woodend Conservation Area (26th edition of the trail guide).
The terrain here is very different from the other sections of the trail that we've hiked. There was much more deciduous tree cover, and the escarpment itself is much less cliff-like - much more erosion and soil cover. The weather was very nice - sunny and clear, but a little hot. Geographically, it was a nice hike, but really, so many other things went wrong, that a lot of us were disappointed with the hike.
First, J lost her camera when she slipped on the trail. We walked back half a klick checking the sides of the trail for it, but couldn't find it.
Next, halfway through the hike, poor Minnie the dog got so many mosquito bites so quickly that it overloaded her immune system, and her face got all swollen and lumpy. Needless to say, this really freaked out S. Luckily, the trail crossed a road right there, so we asked one of the homeowners if there was a drug store nearby, thinking to go there and buy some Benadryl (an antihistamine that I know dogs can take safely). Unfortunately, the directions we got were wrong, and I walked very quickly 1.5km down the road before finding a corner store, where they didn't have any benadryl, and told me that the drugstore was about 8km in the other direction. So, no drugs for Minnie, but I picked up 5 creamsicles and started to hike back towards everyone else, only to find Stacey coming in the store, to tell me that they asked a passing motorist, and he also said that we were going the wrong way.
By the time the two of us got back to the others and Minnie, the swelling had started to go down, so we decided to continue the hike. Through the Bruce Trail. Dodging dirtbikes. Yay.
By the time we finished the hike, we were all hot, tired, and very thirsty. Luckily, we got to wait at the end while S&J drove back to Queenston Heights to get the other car. Then we found the ticks. Wood ticks, not deer ticks, so there is no risk of Lyme disease, but we had to sterilize everything we took on the hike, as well as perform thorough inspections when we got home. Ugh.
Oh, and M apparently had heat exhaustion, and had to pull over on the drive home to be sick.
Not our favourite hike of the trail.
Distance covered today: 13.0km
Total distance covered: 52.2km
Bruce Trail % completed: 5.80%
Total Niagara distance covered: 13.0km
Peninsula% completed: 15.89%
The terrain here is very different from the other sections of the trail that we've hiked. There was much more deciduous tree cover, and the escarpment itself is much less cliff-like - much more erosion and soil cover. The weather was very nice - sunny and clear, but a little hot. Geographically, it was a nice hike, but really, so many other things went wrong, that a lot of us were disappointed with the hike.
First, J lost her camera when she slipped on the trail. We walked back half a klick checking the sides of the trail for it, but couldn't find it.
Next, halfway through the hike, poor Minnie the dog got so many mosquito bites so quickly that it overloaded her immune system, and her face got all swollen and lumpy. Needless to say, this really freaked out S. Luckily, the trail crossed a road right there, so we asked one of the homeowners if there was a drug store nearby, thinking to go there and buy some Benadryl (an antihistamine that I know dogs can take safely). Unfortunately, the directions we got were wrong, and I walked very quickly 1.5km down the road before finding a corner store, where they didn't have any benadryl, and told me that the drugstore was about 8km in the other direction. So, no drugs for Minnie, but I picked up 5 creamsicles and started to hike back towards everyone else, only to find Stacey coming in the store, to tell me that they asked a passing motorist, and he also said that we were going the wrong way.
By the time the two of us got back to the others and Minnie, the swelling had started to go down, so we decided to continue the hike. Through the Bruce Trail. Dodging dirtbikes. Yay.
By the time we finished the hike, we were all hot, tired, and very thirsty. Luckily, we got to wait at the end while S&J drove back to Queenston Heights to get the other car. Then we found the ticks. Wood ticks, not deer ticks, so there is no risk of Lyme disease, but we had to sterilize everything we took on the hike, as well as perform thorough inspections when we got home. Ugh.
Oh, and M apparently had heat exhaustion, and had to pull over on the drive home to be sick.
Not our favourite hike of the trail.
Distance covered today: 13.0km
Total distance covered: 52.2km
Bruce Trail % completed: 5.80%
Total Niagara distance covered: 13.0km
Peninsula% completed: 15.89%