THE MASSASAUGA PROVINCIAL PARK, ONTARIO—JUNE-JULY, 2019

More photos from this trip/więcej zdjęć z tej wycieczki: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jack_1962/albums/72157715782478102 

Blog in Polish/blog w języku polskim: http://ontario-nature-polish.blogspot.com/2020/08/massasauga-provincial-park.html

The Massasauga Provincial Park, just 2 hours from Toronto, is a great park to go canoeing and camping, for both novice and advanced canoeists. Normally I like to camp on more remote campsites, located several hours from the park’s entrance, yet not every canoe partner is willing to paddle that far. So, this year I booked a campsite on Blackstone Harbour, close to the parking lot—I had camped on that campsite many times before.

Upon entering the park, I saw a very welcome addition—a new, big parking lot! Later I spoke to a park employee and was told that from now on it would be possible to park more than one car per campsite, which is awesome. By the way, park staff were very nice and helpful. 

View from our campsite #508

Because of very high water level, some campsites have apparently been flooded and become unusable. Even though I knew my campsite on Blackstone Harbour would be fine (I had camped on it several times, most recently in 2016, 3 years ago--http://ontario-nature.blogspot.com/2016/10/the-massasaga-provincial-park.html), a large patch of its rocky shore was submerged. There were 2 beaver lodges nearby—three years ago they were adjacent to the land—now they resembled small ‘islands’, some 3 meters from the shore. And many trees, which have been under the water for several years, have finally died. 

It was the second part of June, 2020 and I did not expect to see black flies anymore. Unfortunately, I was wrong: due to the rainy weather, they were still active and in spite of using Deet-based insect repellents, I got 20 nasty bites during my entire 12 day stay. Surprisingly, mosquitoes were not that bad—perhaps the wind blew them away. But when I went into the forest, they were swarms of them all over me. 

I have camped on this campsite many times before. This 'photo in photo' shows the same place in 2016, 3 years before. Not much has changed since then, but one tree is gone.

Unfortunately, motorboats are an integral part of the park, yet their noise did not bother me that much. Yet I found jet skis (a.k.a. sea-doos) very annoying. In my opinion, they should be banned from certain lakes in provincial parks. We also heard float planes taking off from Woods Bay, very noisy—and one aircraft even landed on Blackstone Harbour and then took off, generating plenty of deafening noise. Later a park warden told me that it was illegal for float planes to use Blackstone Harbour.

Having the food storage bin on our campsite was terrific, we did not have to worry about hanging food every day. I wish more parks considered installing such containers, they are extremely convenient. 

The weather was very good—it rained once or twice, but otherwise it was not very hot and we enjoyed paddling or just sitting on the campsite, reading books and watching the scenery around us.

Our 'resident snake'

Once we saw a turtle laying eggs in the parking lot near the ramp. The park staff placed pylons and posted notices so that tourists would not drive over those locations. For some reasons turtles love that spot!

Turtles laying eggs at the parking lot, near the boat ramp

Fishing on Blackstone Harbour was very poor. For several days I watched a bass just off our campsite and it took me a lot of time and effort to finally catch it—it was delicious! Our second—and the only other fish we caught—was a small pike. I often observed fishermen in motorboats casting near our campsite, but never saw them catch anything. We spent several hours on Woods Bay, but did not have any luck either. At least we did not have to worry about breaking any fishing regulations and exceeding the catch/possession limit… 

Blue Heron

During my previous visits to this park, in 2016, we had seen several black bears at our campsites. This time the only black bear we spotted was crossing Healy Road—it was quite small, timid and quickly disappeared in the forest—it moved so clumsily and awkwardly that we burst out laughing! But we were lucky to see plenty of other animals on or around our campsite. 

Water snake

Water snakes of various sizes were plentiful, either swimming in the water (one even approached me while I was bathing) or sunning on the rocks. There were two garter snakes on our campsite—one apparently lived in a tree hollow next to the food storage bin. Chipmunks and squirrels were sporadic and always avoided us. My outdoor hunting camera, which I set up near the beaver lodge, recorded a raccoon, but I do not think it ever visited our campsite, we would have certainly noticed such activity. Every evening we saw a beaver or two, swimming nearby—as well as an otter or muskrat. 

Very noisy tree frog!!!

Grey tree frogs commenced their concerto each evening—the sound they generated was earsplitting! It took me a while before I finally spotted one—it was sitting just a meter from our campfire (on the ground) and I gently relocated it farther from the campsite—yet each night I found it at the same location! I saw a lizard, most likely the five-lined skink. 

Five-lined skink

Several snapping turtles were swimming just near the shore. Every evening we were serenaded by loons—one apparently had his habitat next to our campsite and we saw it all the time. Another distinctive sound came from barred owls. Sometimes they were just meters from us, up in the trees—but it was impossible to see them and hear them as they relocated—yes, they can fly noiselessly! Crows would often wake us up, much too early to our liking, though! Twice was saw hummingbirds, but since there were not any flowers, they quickly flew off. The first few day seagulls paid us friendly visits, hoping for a snack, but once they realized that they were not going to get any, they ignored our campsite. Once I was standing next to the tree on the campsite when I heard tapping. I thought my friend was making this sound, yet he was not around. Just seconds later I heard the same sound again—and at the same time pieces of bark and wood chips were falling off the tree all over me. I looked up—and just a meter or so from me was a beautiful pileated woodpecker, aggressively pecking at the tree! I saw it again a few days later, pecking at the same tree. We also saw its smaller cousin, perhaps a red headed woodpecker. 

But the most majestic sight was watching blue herons take off and fly gracefully just above the water surface and land on the shore. Twice a family of geese, including several goslings, came over to our campsite, walked around the tents and proceeded to the water—as well as a flock of ducks & ducklings often swam in front of the campsite. And one day, as I was reading a book, I suddenly realized that a magnificent deer was just standing meters away and intensely staring at me—and then gracefully ran into the forest! I should also mention insects. At night there were swarms of mayflies which were probably reaching the end of their short lifespan—the area around the campfire was covered with them and resembled a living carpet. Dragonflies were plentiful and often hoovered all over us, hunting for mosquitos. We saw several dragonfly nymphs, they were sluggishly moving on the rocks or trees—and in the morning there were only empty shells (called an exuvia), from which the adult dragonfly must have just emerged. Nightly several cockchafers (May bugs) flew around us, attracted by our headlights. And there were plenty of ants everywhere—some were quite big, others smaller and living on the tree—as well as many ant queens.

I loved the view from our campsite!

Several times we canoed to Pete’s Place and then drove to Parry Sound or MacTier to replenish our provisions. Traditionally, in Parry Sound we went to No Frills (a big grocery supermarket), purchased some food items, then drove to the docks and had lunch under the Trestle. After lunch we visited Bearly Used Books (a second-hand bookstore). For the first time I had an opportunity to see the store’s new location. It was on the main street in the same building that members of the federal and provincial parliament had their constituency offices. The place was huge, but in no time I found my way among the thousands upon thousands of books and soon felt like at home—or rather, like at the old location! As always, the staff was very nice and knowledgeable, quickly pointing me to the right area. Unfortunately, this time I was unable to spend too much time in the store, but still managed to buy three very interesting books.

 

Photograph from 2016 and the present view. I always enjoyed sitting near this very characteristic tree!

Just across the street was the Jessica Vergeer Studio. About a year ago I had seen some of Jessica Vergeer works online and I was finally able to visit her store. Indeed, the paintings are awesome and I can appreciate them even more because I have canoed & camped on Georgian Bay for years and have personally seen—or rather experienced—the one-of-a-kind scenery depicted in them. She is a very gifted artist! I bought several postcards of original paintings by Jessica Vergeer as well as vintage-style posters of Parry Sound, Wreck Island, Killbear Provincial Park and the Lighthouses at Snug Harbour and Red Rock. Since I had visited most of these places by canoe and/or camped there, the pictures brought back plenty of wonderful memories!

And one last photo before the end of our trip

Hopefully next time I will camp on in a more remote location of the park, but camping on Blackstone Harbour can be very enjoyable, too!

More photos from this trip/: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jack_1962/albums/72157715782478102 

Blog in Polish/blog w języku polskim: http://ontario-nature-polish.blogspot.com/2020/08/massasauga-provincial-park.html