Hiking with Friends

  Iroquoia Section - 12.44km from the Sydenham Road Lookout to the Grindstone Falls, 25 January 2024. Unseasonably warm weather after vicious cold the week before.  Damp but no rain.  Fog.  Perfect weather for slip-sliding away on the Bruce Trail! It was so slippery that getting out of our cars was fraught.  There were 13 of us eager to get started - from left to right and barely visible apart from me (Doug) and my nostrils were Steve R, Barbara, Lesley, Liz, Nancy, Grace, Sandra, Andrea, Rita, Josie and Frank.  Marleen was in there somewhere but hiding! Yours truly was the coordinator, Sandra was the sweep.  I, Frank, Josie, Lesley, Liz, Nancy and Sandra contributed photographs.  Such a lot of photographs gerblunden *# !  Being the blogger is hard!  Two, four, six, eight, who do we appreciate?  KEN!! Off we went!  All of us were wearing icers.  It was  drizzling a little which is why our hoods were up. Our first bridge picture.  Just entering the Royal Botanical Gardens' Rock Chap

  Iroquoia Section - Sydenham Road (58.8 km) to Sherman Falls (46.6 km) - Jan. 18, 2024. After a fairly mild start to our winter season, some snow and lower temperatures have arrived and the Hiking With Friends group was somewhat glad to put the memories of the muddy Bruce Trail last week behind us, and experience a more traditional cold weather hike this  week. Where did we do this, you ask?..well, it was mostly in the familiar confines of the Dundas Valley Conservation Area (with a little bit of urban Dundas thrown in), as we traveled about 13 km from the Sydenham Road lookout to Sherman Falls, near the Artaban Road parking area. How did it go, you ask?...well, let's have a look! At just over 4 hours in length (including a  couple of refreshment stops), this route has a little bit of everything...icy waterfalls, in town road walking, a horse farm, a warm and comfortable place for a mid-hike break, and great scenery...we will have to climb a decent 350 meters to experience all thi