How a canoeist revelled in Georgian Bay’s wilderness This book, published by McClelland & Stewart in 1926, covers a period from the late 19th Century to the first two decades of the 20th. The Bay was quite different back then. Logging was declining but still active, leaving much of the shoreline and interior denuded ofContinue reading “The islands were happy, even a century ago”
Category Archives: Just Thoughts
How we love this place…
If you have read “About this blog” and gone on to “Who is this Ancient Islander“, you may understand how I came by my affection for Georgian Bay. But these legacies are not unique to me or my extended family. Numerous permanent and seasonal residents have felt the pull of this region for centuries andContinue reading “How we love this place…”
The last one…
On a clear day during the migration season, up and into the 19th Century, the skies around the Great Lakes might turn black. That is when literally millions of Ectopistes migratorius — the legendary Passenger Pigeon — were winging their ways to or from their nesting areas. At perhaps as many as 5 billion, itContinue reading “The last one…”
Longevity on the Bruce
On a cliff above Georgian Bay at Lion’s Head is the oldest living tree in Ontario. It’s not a towering majestic pine or hardwood. It’s a lowly, twisted, gnarley white cedar that you probably wouldn’t give a second glance. Yet that tree has clung to its rocky perch for 1,316 years! Its remote and ruggedContinue reading “Longevity on the Bruce”
The versatile canoe, and hats off to paddlers
Canoes, despite their fragility, were for centuries an essential and effective means of transportation for indigenous people throughout North America, including Georgian Bay. Before today’s pace of life with pressures and deadlines, travellers could simply pull into shore to shelter until bad weather let up. In the early 17th Century, Wendat (Huron) fishing parties wouldContinue reading “The versatile canoe, and hats off to paddlers”
Spooky, or what?
On our page Who is this Ancient Islander the cottage Wasa-Waba is mentioned as where it all began for me. But there is another side to this quaint old place, one that might make your hair stand on end. In the 1920s Wasa-Waba was a small store, probably only seasonal for the nearby cottagers andContinue reading “Spooky, or what?”
Living in harmony with the land and water
A nature writer who has been my idol for about 60 years is the late Sigurd F. Olson of Ely, Minnesota. The title of his first book was The Singing Wilderness. Now, how can that not make you want to read it? His home ground was the Quetico-Superior canoe country northwest of Lake Superior. ButContinue reading “Living in harmony with the land and water”
Blending in
I’ve been wanting to sound off about this for years. Now’s my chance, so here goes. From the time the first cottages began appearing along the Georgian Bay shore up until around the early 1930s, many owners for some reason wanted them to stand out, be noticed — whatever — and painted them white, maybeContinue reading “Blending in”
Special places
There are special places at Georgian Bay that we should leave alone. Particularly if they are on private or First Nations land. We may not understand why, but to someone, somewhere, these places have a deep meaning. Long before Europeans came to Georgian Bay indigenous people had remote locations where they rested the remains ofContinue reading “Special places”
SWEETWATERS 