Tuesday,
July 17, 2001
Day
9: Etobicoke to Hamilton
I was up once again at 06:00 and ready to
go at 07:00. We drove down the block to "The Grille", the restaurant
we had seen the evening before, where we both had full breakfasts of Eggs,
sausages, whole wheat toast, and coffee.
After breakfast, we returned to the motel.
I set out at 08:20 and retraced my route
along east Queensway and then south down Kipling to the Lakeshore. When I got to the Kipling-Lakeshore
Boulevard corner where I had turned the day before, I continued straight across
it and into the grounds of Humber College.
I was now entering new territory.
I rode through the College grounds until I picked up the bike path by
the shoreline.
Etobicoke is the westernmost of Toronto's suburbs. See 7.
Notes on Etobicoke, in the Supplementary Notes section of the previous day's notes, for more
information and background on this Toronto Suburb.
It was a very foggy morning, and there
was a light drizzle as the trial led me through various waterfront parks
interspersed with quiet suburban streets.
I came into Mississauga by the
back route, crossing the Etobicoke Creek via a footbridge in Marie Curtis Park.
Mississauga, a collection of smaller towns and villages, is now one of
Canada's largest "cities".
Along the waterfront, Port Credit is the main feature.. See 1.
Notes on Mississauga, in the Supplementary Notes section below, for more information and
background.
The Trail in Mississauga continued wended
its way through the back streets and along waterfront parks until I came out at
the harbour of Port Credit. As I rode
inland along the eastern side of the harbour, I saw a large chunk of what had
once been green space now giving way to development. It was depressing. Port
Credit itself was a delightful, though touristy- looking place. Very pretty.
From Port Credit, I had to continue along Lakeshore Boulevard
for a while. I passed by mostly houses,
large houses with lots of greenery. The
roadway was pleasant, being large with wide shoulders.
At 10:00 I came to Jack Darling Park,
where I was able to take off again onto a dedicated bike path. From Lakeshore Road the trail led straight
to the water's edge, at right angles to the roadway. The trail then went for
a stretch right along the beach. I stopped briefly to look up and down the
still foggy coastline. There were lots
of ducks and geese and swans to watch.
From the park began a complicated
zig-zag, through a fairly upscale housing
area. There were with lots of hills and streets that wound to
and fro. Many streets had large shade
trees and there were sections of woods.
The scenery was very nice, but I knew I
was not making much forward progress.
I finally came out at Southdown Road at 10:20
I recalled Southdown Road from my studies
of the map the evening before. It was
here that the route took a sharp turn to the south, to continue running along
the lake shore. The road going
straight, what had so far been Lakeshore Road, continued on into the heart of
Oakville, well away from the water. I
had warned Sheryl to be on the lookout for the left turn she would have to
make.
Along Orr Road, approaching Southdown
road, I had been behind the big Petro Canada
refinery. They had hidden it
very well with trees and earthen walls, so that it blended into the suburban
setting like a park.
The area became more clearly industrial
as I neared the foot of Southdown Road, however, To my left was the huge refinery and to my right a big cement
factory. A lot of smaller industrial
companies were nestled in between.
Picketers had set up camp in front of the Petro Canada gates, complete
with fires in barrels to warm themselves, and were halting all delivery trucks.
Right at the lake shore, amidst this
industrial jungle, was a small green
lakeside park. I took the detour and got right down to the lake's edge, from
where I could look out at the long, industrial pier of the cement company,
where a ship was loading.
A bike trail led westward from the park,
alongside the now industrial Lakeshore Boulevard, but sheltered from it by
trees, and separated from the road by a greenspace. This section of trail came to an end at Winston Churchill
Boulevard, which marked the boundary of
Oakville. It was 10:45 when I reached
there.
Next in line is Oakville, another "composite" community. Bronte Harbour is the main feature. See 2.
Notes on Oakville, in the Supplementary Notes section below, for more information and
background.
I would have to ride on Lakeshore
Boulevard itself all the way through Oakville,. East of the town centre, the
road was arrow and had no
shoulder. Once past the town
centre, there would be a cycling path alongside the road, a sort of a sidewalk
doubling as a bike path. While there
were still a few open spaces, even farms, most of the ride was past large
lakefront estates complete with walls and ornate gates. Alas, many of these fine estates were in the
process of being broken up into smaller developments.
I got to the centre of Oakville at 11:10
and found there were a few blocks of trendy shops. All was new, but trying to look old. I passed over the river, both sides of which were thick with
sailing craft at anchor.
And Lakeshore Boulevard continued.. It was only at Coronation Park that I was
able to leave the road. By the back way, and the shoreline, I finally come out
at the pier of Bronte's Harbour at 12:00.
I sat out as far as I could get on the
pier, to relax and have my lunch. I called Sheryl. She was just getting started, having studied all morning at the
motel, and was at just that moment turning the corner of Kipling and
Lakeshore. I told her that Lakeshore
promised to be a nice drive, and suggested to her she might find Oakville's
downtown interesting. Actually, though,
she would end up spending the better
part of the afternoon at Port Credit.
For lunch I had hummus and apple slices,
with grapes and cheese, basically clearing out what remained of my leftovers.
Looking westward along the shore with my
field glasses, I saw off in the haze a long jetty stretching out into the
lake. There was an oil tanker out at
the end of the pier unloading fuel.
I was kind of reluctant to leave the
Bronte Harbour area, as it was so nice.
Finally, though, after 20 minutes break, I set out again.
The Waterfront Trail markers led me back
up along Twelve Mile Creek to Lakeshore Boulevard. The bridge at Lakeshore was the only crossing. At the corner, I ducked into a gas station
and bought the next in the "MapArt" series, the street map of
Hamilton.
I then proceeded on, west along Lakeshore
Boulevard once more. The bike path had
evolved into a sort of separated and paved strip, which doubled as sidewalk and
bike path.
I had only ridden a short ways round the
point when I came to a vast green space on the right, which they were converting
into a golf course. Across the road was
a tiny, completely deserted little park.
What what remarkable was that this tiny park sported a fancy fountain. It was called "South Shell Park",
and was obviously built by the oil company whose pier was right next door,
probably to placate the nearby homeowners.
The oil company was now Petro Canada, but I surmised from the park name
that it must have been Shell Oil in the beginning.
Looking out from under the trees at the
head of the cliff, I now had a good view of the ship unloading at the
pier. I took a few minutes to study it
with my field glasses.
Five minutes later I was on my way again,
still along Lakeshore. I made the
Burlington town line at 12:50. At that
point, the separated bike path/sidewalk paved strip switched over to the left
hand side of the road. I continued
following it for a while, but the surface became so bumpy that I finally opted
for the road. Although the roadway was narrow, and with lots of traffic
squeezing by me, at least the surface was good.
Burlington, at the end of Lake Ontario, was first settled by the Loyalist
Mohawk Chief Joseph Brandt. See 3. Notes on Burlington, in the Supplementary Notes section below, for more
information and background.
Through Burlington the scenery was pretty
much as it had been in Oakville. There
were lots of fine houses. It was still
completely residential. I passed no businesses.
At one point the road came right out to
touch the waterfront, with no houses barring the view. Sioux Lookout was the
name of the tiny park. .Looking west, I was able to see the Burlington Skyway
Bridge for the first time, off in the hazy distance.
At 13:20, half an hour into Burlington, I
crossed Guelph Line Road. From that
point on the houses began rapidly to give way to apartment buildings. I was suddenly into the built-up, commercial
area of town. From the map I saw that the Trail followed the trendy looking
"Old Lakeshore Road", first into a park and thence down to the
waterfront.
I decided to take a pause from my onward
journey and take a gander at downtown Burlington. It was 13:30 when rode up Brant Street, the main street, and then
back down a side street. I did not see
much of interest, so I went back to Old Lakeshore Road and picked up the Trail
where I had left it. The Trail led me
down onto a beautiful waterfront terrace which facing downtown. From the downtown buildings, fronted by
Lakeshore Road, a grassy expanse swept down the hill in a wide, flat
terrace. The terrace ended in a flat,
straight pier, running along the shoreline.
Immediately beyond, the arm of
Burlington Beach struck off to the south at nearly a right angle.. I was visibly at the extreme western end of
Lake Ontario.
Lookout out south across the lake, I
could see a ship heading towards the entrance to the canal that cuts through
the long spit of land separating Burlington Bay from Lake Ontario.
As I rode around past the end of the
waterfront park, the Trail led up to the top of this narrow spit of land, where
there was a gravel trail for walking and for cyclists. Just down the slope to my left was the
beach, hidden mostly by the trees. To
my right, down the other slope, was Lakeshore Road, curving around to head
across the Bay. Over my head was
climbing the massive, six-laned structure of the Burlington Skyway, which would
allow the QEW to pass over the ship canal.
From 13:30 to 13:55 I was riding along
this beach strip, taking only one five minute stop to walk out and feel the
water and to look up and down the beach.
Although the area was now a park, there were a few holdouts who still
had private beachfront cottages nestled in the trees.
It was a great feeling having the wind finally behind me. I felt like I was just flying along!
As I came to the drawbridge at 14:05, I
could see the ship I had seen earlier still approaching and knew the bridge
operator would be raising the bridge any moment. It looked like the best vantage point for watching the ship pass
would be on the far side. Thus, when I heard the whistle, and was already on
the approach, I hurried across, stopping at the far side as soon as I reached
the non- lifting part of the bridge. I
did not notice that I was still inside the gates. I noted this only, when I became conscious of the huge drop only
a few feet away from my stopping point.
By this time the pedestrian gate had already cut off my exit. The bridge operator would be coming out to
give me hell for being inside the gate and for having raced across the bridge
once he had blown the whistle.
Stuck where I was, and already having
gotten hell, I relaxed and watched the long ship come through the channel and
then studied the mechanism as the big bridge lowered once again. Once the bridge operator opened the gates, I
got off the bridge as quickly as I could.
While waiting on the bridge, I had
noticed a long walkway, the length of the channel, from a pier and lighthouse
to at the lake end to a pier and lighthouse on the bay side. I found a road where I could ride down alongside
the bridge to get access to the pier. I
parked my bike and climbed down as I did not immediately see how I could cycle
onto it. After walking a bit, I did see
how I could have cycled down, but I did
not feel like going all the way back for my bike. I was also not too sure how the bridge keeper would react to
seeing me cycle on this protected road, especially after his earlier
chastisement.
I walked down to the Bay end of the pier
and I spent some time studying the big
steel mills in detail with my field glasses. I took some photos of, these
plants as best as I could see them through the general haze of the day. I was hoping the bright, red flames of the
blast furnaces would come out in my photos.
While walking back, I noticed yet another
ship getting ready to come through the canal so I waited and watched as the
bridge was raised again and the ship, a tanker this time, and much smaller than
the previous ship, came on through.
If I had
had more time, I would have walked on down to the lake end of the
pier. It was a long way, though, and I
was concerned about leaving my bike unattended so far away. It was also getting late and I had already
spent over 40 minutes hanging around the bridge.
So I set out once again at 14:45. The map showed the Waterfront Trail to run
along the top of the beach, but I found this way to be impossible. There was only loose sand. So I started to ride along Lakeshore
Boulevard, which had now become Eastport Drive. Almost immediately, I was forced to exit to the left, as Eastport
Driver went on ahead to joint onto the freeway. I exited onto Beach Boulevard and found myself riding down
through the middle of the small hamlet of Hamilton Beach.
Hamilton is Canada's Steeltown, and a major city.. See 4. Notes on Hamilton, in the Supplementary Notes section below, for more
information and background.
Hamilton Beach seemed like an old,
forgotten community. There were lots of short, half-block streets exiting both
to the right and to the left. Beach Boulevard was long, and there were only a
few, small business establishments.The residences were a mix of old summer
beach houses mixed with newer, more permanent homes.
Right after turning onto Beach Boulevard,
I passed this old fellow sitting out in his yard amidst a pile of junk, and
with a sign saying "Antiques".
Even though it was only 14:50, I called Sheryl 10 minutes early to let
her know she should look out for the tricky turn (to be in the left lane), and
for this guy's shop. Sheryl was still
in Port Credit.
As I rode down the central axis of this
town I stopped a couple of times and rode out to the end of the dead end
streets, hoping to see that the Waterfront Trail had resumed. It had not.
Finally, I got to the end of Beach
Boulevard, and exited the comfortable looking Hamilton Beach community onto the
antiseptic Van Wagner's Beach Boulevard.
Gone now were the houses. I was on a wide, deserted boulevard amidst the
open dunes, with the elevated highway just to my right.
In a clover leaf interchange, this
boulevard intersected and went under the elevated QEW to my right, to become
Centennial Parkway in Hamilton proper.
Sheryl would go that way. It was
at this same point that a very nice off-road bike path began. It was called locally "The
Breezeway", and it went through
the park that was right along the beach.
I had a great ride for about 4km.
To my left was the beach and the lake, and to my right, separating me
from the QEW expressway, was a strip of green parkland with lots of trees.
It was near the end of this parkway that
I found a place to stop for a ten
minute rest and some yoghurt. It was
15:30, and I was beginning to think of
finding some lodging. I was hoping to
find a nice, old motel right along the QEW.
When I started up again, my path led me
through a campground and then out of the park and through the suburban streets
of the hamlet of Community Beach. Past the houses, I was back onto a gravel
path and crossing undeveloped fields.
The map showed this to be Frances Avenue, but there was no such road.
I came out finally at the North Service
Road of the QEW, and came upon a motel that seemed the answer to my
prayer. According to the map, it might
have been the "Cherry Beach Motor Inn". Although the motel seemed old and quite a bit run down, the
location was perfect. The time, 16:00,
was perfect, too.
I went to the office and inquired of this
lady in her late twenties who looked like she had just gotten up from an
all-nighter. She hesitated, but finally
said that, Yes, she had a room. She
explained that most of her guests stayed by the week or by the month, but that
they kept a few rooms for overnighters.
It would be $45, but there was no sink.
Some people had gotten drunk recently and had ripped it out of the
wall. When I balked, she offered me
another room at $55. I asked to see
it. My first impression of the room was that it was as hot as Hades. No, there were no longer any air
conditioners. Sorry, the windows did not open.
They were nailed shut. The dust was thick on everything,and the walls
had fist holes in them.
As much as I really wanted to stop there,
for it would have been the perfect location, the room was just too run
down. I had to decline. It was the heat and the stuffyness of the
room that did it the most for me.
The hostess mentioned that the owner did
not put much into the place. Clearly,
they were holding onto the motel only until their property could profitably
join the flood of development happening all around.
I continued on, drudgingly at this
point. I had originally thought I might
get as far as Grimsby that day. I could
see now that this goal had been overly ambitious. I was also concerned about continuing for feat that I might not
find lodging in such a small town as Grimsby.
I was riding at this point along the
North Service Road of the QEW, which had become far less than interesting. I
was separated from the lake by a row of
houses.
Eventually, I came to the next
interchange, which announced itself as Stoney Creek. Looking ahead from the height of the interchange, all I could see
quite a ways down the Service Road.
Although factories and farmland could be seen, I did not see any motels.
I figured I would have to go inland, to
the old highway, which had been Highway 8.
I was at Fruitland Road and taken, at
that point, by the stark contrast between the old street to my left - with its
old, established houses - and the new developments going up ahead. It was such a resume of what Ihad been
seeing all along my travels through the Toronto area.
I crossed over the QEW and pedalled
inland, towards the Niagara Escarpment, which I could clearly see looming just
a couple of kilometers ahead.
Along Fruitland there were factories and tract houses on one side and
open farmland on the other. Fruitland Road seemed to mark the extent of the
urbanization I had been riding in since Bowmanville, two days earlier. The first major cross street, Barton Road,
was a six-laned boulevard to the right (west) and a two-laned country road to
the left (east). West was behind me
now, for I had now come around the end of the lake and was heading in the
opposite direction, to the east.
Next, after Barton, I came to Highway 8,
also a busy boulevard. Since in the
direction I had been going was only farmland, I figured I had better backtrack
towards Stoney Creek.
I rode along, through suburban strip-mall
land, but encountered no motels. I was becoming more and more disheartened with
each kilometer, knowing that I would have to cover all this territory again the
next day.
When Sheryl called I was at the corner of
Hwy 8 and King Street, where the signs for "Downtown Stoney Creek"
pointed along King Street,. At that
point, I was once again even with
Community Beach, where I had earlier been at 15:30. Sheryl told me she had just
turned the corner onto Centennial Parkway, and so I knew she was only a few
minutes away. I decided it was time to
stop and let her pick me up, so that we could look together for lodging, and
with the car.
She came on to get me around 17:30. I unpacked the bike and put it onto the car
rack, and then we continued on in along Highway 8 towards Hamilton.
As we drove and drove and drove, things
did not look too promising. We passed
into Hamilton proper, and suburbia gave way to a very urban looking
environment.
Finally, out of the blue, we came to this
traffic circle where there was a motel.
City Motor Lodge seemed like a live throwback to the 1950s. Even
though they had a pool, the price was still reasonable, at $65, so we
took the room. I felt better
immediately, knowing that lodging was taken care of. We had backtracked to the point where I was even with Hamilton
Beach, though on the other side of the Bay and the Steel Mills.
It was already late, so I just stowed the
bike and my gear in our ground floor room and quickly changed into my street
clothes. We then set off looking for a
restaurant. Although there was a restaurant attached to the motel, it did not
look very palatable.
I figured that downtown would offer the
best chance of finding a decent restaurant, so we drove in along Hwy 8, which
had now become Main Street, and which then split into King Street west bound
and Main Street east bound. The only
halfway decent food establishment we passed was a McDonald's, at the point of
the split. It was a very run-down
street. We got all the way downtown,
only to find the downtown deserted.
Even though we passed several large conference hotels, we saw no people
out on the streets and no restaurants.
Trying to go back the way I had come, I
got turned around. I could not get over
to left fast enough to make a turn off
and so found myself on a freeway-like road leading up the steep face of
the Niagara Escarpment. The road was
called the "Claremont Access" and I soon found myself on Upper James
Street, and out into suburban mall land.
It was in this upper part of Hamilton that one found all the nicer,
middle-class looking homes. We saw the
usual chain restaurants. We passed a
"Keg", but decided we could not stomach the same thing three days in
a row. There was an East Side Marios,
which was our favourite until we spied this Chinese Buffet. It had been a long time, since pre-diet,
that we had not done Chinese Buffet, so we ate there. We gorged ourselves on a totally diet-busting dinner of forbidden
foods. Both of us left feeling stuffed
like fatted calves, a feeling we had not felt since starting on the diet at
Christmas.
After supper, I retraced our route. We came down off the Escarpment and then returned east on Main Street and
back to the motel. As we drove, Sheryl
scoped out some stores she would check out the next day. When we got to the room, she settled
immediately into bed.
I was still full of energy, and so went
on a little walkabout. I crossed the
road to the Tim Horton's to get a coffee.
Then I went to the depanneur, and finally to an old run down
supermarket/drugstore, trying to locate the next "MapArt" map in the
series I had been using. I found only
Rand-McNally Maps, but I was used to the MapArt ones which served my purpose
better as the Waterfront Trail was clearly marked.
I checked out the possibilities of the
"restaurant" at the motel for breakfast. It had degenerated into a
bar with a few regulars gathered around the slot machines (aka video
terminals). Besides my serious doubts
about the quality of the food, the restaurant did not open for breakfast until
08:30, which cinched it for me. I hoped
to be well on my way by that time.
I returned to my room with my coffee and
wrote in this journal until 23:00
Daily
Report
According to a later, detailed study of
the kilometrage, based on map readings and my hourly log:
·
I travelled a forward (towards my goal)
distance of 70 km, for a total cumulative forward distance of 661 km.
·
Total distance travelled this day 78, for
a total distance travelled of 699 km.
·
I rode for 5 h 50, with an additional 2 h
50 in breaks, for a total of 8 h 40 on the road.
·
My average speed was 12 km/hr
[See the Kilometrage Study for details]