Sun, Aug 5 2007 - Lazy Sunday Hike: Eldred King Woodlands (View Original Event Details)
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This was a last minute hike idea, intended for those of us who were unlucky enough to be stuck in the city for the long weekend. The calendar looked embarrassingly bare as many of our volunteers were off on great adventures of camping, backpacking and travelling to Calgary. In my current condition, I am not supposed to be over exerting myself, but a new hike posted at Toronto Hiking to one of Rocky's favourite hiking spots was hard to resist. The folks at Toronto Hiking found a series of loops that took our normal 2 - 3K hike to a more respectable 15 K length. I knew the Oak Ridges Forest tract trails were generally wide and easy to traverse. We'd take it at a relatively easy pace and called it a Lazy Sunday hike - for those who just want to get out on a dull Sunday of a long weekend
The hike almost started with disappointment well before the day - the first 10 or so signups were in town for a reason, it seemed...no car! I had to move a few people on the wait list and cross my fingers we'd have some drivers sign up. Luckily we ended up with more than enough drivers, as is usually the case. We were able to accomodate everyone, and people still signed up, so I kept trying to add more and more people - with so little on the calendar this weekend I wanted everyone to get a chance to go. In the end, there were some last minute signups that were disappointed, but we managed to put together a large group of 23 hikers
The first thing we realized as we entered the Eldred King parking lot, was that there was a charity trail ride going through the same trails we planned on walking. This meant dogs had to stay on leash (probably a disappointment only for Rocky) and a quick lesson in trail etiquette. Many of the horses we passed were bombproof and had no reaction to dogs and people on foot, but a few looked like they weren't having anything to do with us. We passed maybe 25 horses or more and no incidents. Everyone was very respectful, walking single file past the horses and keeping voices down and movements simple. I can't say the same for Rocky who barked angrily at a few horses on a few occasions, but was mostly ignored.
The first part of the trail was easy as I had traversed it many times. I was unsure of the route as described by Toronto Hking, and gave one map to Julian to lead the front of the group with my plan to sweep behind. We immediately started out on the wrong path. We managed to get everyone turned around and back on track, up to the pond where we had a quick snack, and let the dogs have a good romp, swim and cooldown before continueing onwards. Our progress was slower than I had anticipated in the beginning and I knew that we had to pick up the pace. if we wanted to complete the 15 K in a decent time. The trail map showed three loops where people could drop off if the pace or heat or terrain (or dog!) became too overwhelming. At the first loop, we had to take leave of Amir, who bravely struggled to keep up for the first 3 or 4 K, but an injury was going to force him to drop out. I was tempted to join him for the short trek back to the car lot, but I was determined to move on - it was early still.
Somewhere midway through the second loop, while looking for a place for lunch we came across a trail dilemma. We were supposed to be following the blue blazes, which identify a side trail when we discovered two separate, unmarked blue blazed side trails, one going West the other South. The written description appeared to tell us to take the path to the left, so we did. And we followed that path to a shady spot for lunch, then on again, thinking that the description was doing it justice -there was T intersections where there was supposed to be T intersections and Y intersections where they said a Y intersection would be. Charlie and Amber, our two other dog trekkers were getting tired and overheated, Amber being a respectable 10 yrs old and Charlie a mere 8 months, both had had enough hiking and heat for one day. According to what I *thought* was the map, we were heading to our second loop which would enable a group to break off and head back to the parking lot. However, at the point where I was convinced we were almost finished loop two we finally found a sign that pinpointed our location - which was no where near where I had thought we were by our map. Thoroughly confused, I made the executive decision that we'd better follow the sign and everyone head back to the parking lot together. We still had a ways to go, and it was hot, I was tired and the trails were very sandy, which made the hike a bit more than a lazy hike. Most of the hikers seemed in excellent spirits with tons of energy,. so it may have just been me. We managed to find our way back to the parking lot finally, with just one more missed turn and a slight backtrack - luckily a trailrider confirmed we'd got to our destination this way...eventually...
After the hike, a few of us headed over to Chalker's for some food and drinks.
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