Travel Close to Home # 9: A Place of Imagination

 As a lifelong history buff and historian, I am always fascinated by historic sites with only the slightest remnants of whatever was once there -- and the way such sites force me to use my imagination to populate them and bring them to life.  

Today's post deals with such a place, one that I tripped over only because I zoomed in closer on the right segment of Google Maps while looking for something else altogether.  If there's one lesson I've learned during this series of travels to sites of interest, it's to zoom in closer on Google Maps -- just in case.

Southwold Earthworks lies in western Elgin County, south by southwest from London, along County Road 14.  It's 8 kilometres southeast from Highway 401, through Iona Station and Iona, and just a few hundred metres north of County Road 16.  Follow the exit signs from Highway 401 for Iona, and as soon as you're off the main highway you will see signs giving direction and distance to Southwold Earthworks.

It's a National Historic Site maintained by Parks Canada, but there is no admission fee.

The earthworks in this case are a double line of earthen mounds surrounding an oval-shaped site of level ground.  This was the site of a longhouse village of the Neutral peoples between 1500 and 1650, likely closer to the beginning of that time period.  The earthworks formed a foundation for the wooden palisades which surrounded the village.

Like their compatriots of the Six Nations, Huron, and others, the Neutrals settled in villages so they could cultivate fields of beans, corn, and squash.  These produce items, together with gathered nuts and berries, and the catch from hunting and fishing, gave the people a broad-based and nutritious diet.  The size of the village enclosure, and the number of foundations excavated within it during the 1930s and again in the 1970s, suggest that the population of this settlement could likely have exceeded 800 people.

So with that introduction, let's turn on the imagination and visit this site.  From a small roadside parking area, you enter a grassy walkway between fences, which separates the site access from adjacent farmland.

Inside the entrance, you come to the first of three interpretive signs, this one with a map showing the locations of other similar earthworks that have been found across Ontario.  The sign mentions that this is the only known location in Canada of a double earthwork, which also indicates that there would have been a double palisade.

It took me about 7 minutes of walking at a leisurely pace to reach the main site.  The ground is reasonably level, with no steep hills, but rather bumpy -- like a suburban lawn that hasn't been rolled since halfway to forever.  The earthwork mounds are not especially tall, but the artificial nature of the work is plain to see.

A second sign at the edge of the site shows the approximate layout of the site today, together with artist renderings of some of the artifacts excavated here.

Today, the site is home to a couple of dozen mature trees, but these have grown up at some time during the centuries after the site was abandoned by the Neutral people.  The land would have been completely cleared for the village within the earthen mounds.

In the middle of the site, a third sign gives an artist rendering of the village at its peak, based on the findings of archaeological excavations in 1935 and 1976.

With upwards of 50 people living in a single longhouse, and with the houses fitted so closely together, the village would certainly have been a busy place in its heyday.

The entry walk brings you to the southwest corner of the site.  I walked across the centre of the circle, and then stood on top of the inner mound at the north side to take this picture across the site as a whole.  

Here's the same picture, with an arrow indicating the location of the second of the three signs.  That one is located just outside the outer mound at the far side of the site, which gives a good indication of the total size of the village when it existed.

It was an entertaining exercise to try to imagine the bustle of the settlement, and to populate this parkland with all the people who once lived here.

Southwold Earthworks doesn't require a lengthy visit -- I spent a total of 25 minutes there -- but it does provide an enjoyable and easy walk in a peaceful setting, and the chance to touch at least a bit the lives of people who lived here as much as five centuries ago.

To conclude, here's a map to show the location of this national historic site.

 

Travel Close to Home # 8: The Winter Woods Are Ready

Taking advantage of what was almost certainly the final day of our warmer-than-usual early November period, I drove up to the conservation area at Hilton Falls in Halton Region.

As with the other Halton Region Conservation Parks I've visited (Rattlesnake Point and Kelso), so here too advance reservations are required to enter.  Here's the reservation link again:

Halton Parks Reservations

In common with the other parks, this one had an area of mown lawns surrounding the parking lot and the small visitor's centre located near the entrance, with washrooms.  A gravelled path leads past these buildings up to the access road and then across the pavement to the woods.  At once the path turns left and begins to climb -- and it's definitely a keep-your-eyes-on-the-ground path, liberally studded with rocks.

Of course, what you are climbing here is none other than our old friend, the Niagara Escarpment, which has figured in several of my adventures -- not only in the other Halton conservation areas but also in the provincial park at Mono Cliffs.  Look around to the left as you climb and there, across the valley and Highway 401, is the high bluff at Kelso Conservation Area, on the north end of the Escarpment's Milton Outlier.

At the top of the last, steepest bit, the trail levels out.  

The first hundred metres or so of the trail at the top of the hill are lined, along the left side only (odd), by multiple clumps of rounded boulders, coated with generous layers of moss.  I wonder if these were rocks that were dug up and tossed off to the side during the work of levelling and widening the path.

It's ironic that a trail which has such a rocky start should actually turn out overall to be one of the easiest hikes I've taken in Escarpment country.  As you wend your way northwards into the forest, the trail is broad and well levelled, with only minimal curves and hills to add variety.

This late in November, the winter phase of the forest's life is well prepared.  The leaves are all down, except for a very few stubborn holdouts, and the bare trees actually admit more natural light than at any almost other time of the year.  Only when the ground is covered with the reflecting coat of snow will it appear any brighter than it does now.  Shorn of their foliage, the tree trunks become striking natural sculptures, silhouetted against the blue sky. 

To no one's surprise, there are choices of trails to follow, as shown clearly on the trail map posted at the park entrance and also at a junction near the falls.

This close-up of the map shows only the southern one-third of the park, which extends much farther north and west out of my picture frame.  I was following the yellow Hilton Falls Trail, the most direct route to the falls.  I'll save the much longer Red Oak Trail for another visit when I am not so time-constrained by the Covid-related 2-hour time limit on visits.  The round trip along the trail, with time to look around at the Falls, took me about 75 minutes.

This park also had better and more consistent use of trail markers and the numbered junction signposts than Rattlesnake Point, and far more comprehensive signage than Kelso.

As I arrived at the Falls proper, the first thing I noticed was the familiar sight of trees struggling to get a foothold on the staircase layers of rocks, and especially on the very brink of the canyon into which the falls tumble.

Hilton Falls itself turned out to be a lacy cascade, not much more than a mere thread of water, as you would expect this late in the year.  The eroded rocks of the bowl around the falls, and the undercutting of the upper layers, show very clearly that there can be far more water falling over this rim during flood times and spring runoff.

A footnote: I was at Hilton Falls around 10:45 in the morning.  It would be more advantageous to come in the early afternoon, when the sun would shine on the falling water, creating a much more sparkling effect.  It was a lovely sight, even so.

I'll wrap up with a map showing the location of Hilton Falls in relation to the major towns and cities of southwestern Ontario.

Like all of the natural areas and parks which I've travelled to share with you in this series of posts, Hilton Falls is a beauty spot that would definitely repay future visits in any season of the year. 

 

Travel Close to Home # 7: Quiet Beauty in Autumn

You might think I'd be slowing down as fall sets in, but not on your life.  Indeed, I feel the urge to go somewhere and do something with every sunny, half-way warm day that comes along now.

That definitely included yesterday, when the sun came slowly out through the course of the morning and the temperature rose to a pleasant but not hot 12°C (53°F).

Earlier in this series of posts, I paid a visit to the provincial park on Long Point, on the shore of Lake Erie  -- you can read about that one here:  Taking the Long View 

In that article, I made a passing reference to other locations on the Lake Erie shore which share common environmental characteristics with Long Point.  One of those is the Pointe aux Pins peninsula southwest of London, home to Rondeau Provincial Park.  This is actually the second-oldest provincial park in Ontario, dating back to 1894 -- the year after the establishment of Algonquin Provincial Park.  Rondeau is where I headed yesterday.

Like Long Point, Pointe aux Pins takes the form of a sandspit protecting a sizable wetland area and sheltering behind it an enclosed bay.  It slopes out from the shore of the lake at a very similar angle to Long Point, but in the opposite direction.  The resulting bay is roughly oval in shape, hence the name "Rondeau" from the French ronde eau ("round water").  

This aerial photo from the internet gives you an impression.  The camera is facing almost due south.

Unlike Long Point, Rondeau Provincial Park occupies almost all of the peninsula.  The picture shows clearly that most of Rondeau Bay (on the top right) is very shallow and sandy.  Much of the Bay is also contained within the park's jurisdiction.  Even the sizable cottage community visible along the shoreline of the peninsula lies inside the park boundaries, with all the cottages built on leased land.  Those cottages have been the source of much controversy, with the local government declaring them a heritage district while the province has more than once attempted to terminate the cottagers' leases.  I won't venture an opinion on this issue, except to say that both sides undoubtedly have persuasive arguments for their respective points of view.  

Again resembling Long Point, this peninsula is actually mostly wetland, even where it is forested, and it's the role of that wetland as a nesting and migrating area for birds that has made this park such an important natural resource.  

So, time for a visit!  If you want to get to Rondeau from either east or west, the easiest way is to follow the main freeway, Highway 401, and exit southbound at Kent Bridge Road.  This road, Chatham-Kent Municipal Road 15, will take you straight to the park.  I was intrigued to see on Google Maps that the trip should take only 2 minutes longer if I forsook Highway 401 and instead followed the parallel provincial Highway 4 and Elgin County Road 3 from London.  Definitely a smart move -- a much less stressful drive, and much more varied roadside scenery.  The trip down from London took about 70 minutes.

Also a smart move: waiting until this late in the fall to go.  The campgrounds are closed for the winter, and at 10:15 on a weekday morning I had the entire park nearly to myself.

Upon reaching the shore of the lake, the road crosses what is in effect a causeway -- although a very short one -- flanked on both sides by wetlands.  Here's the view on the east side, which shows the innermost end of Rondeau Bay, a tract of sandbanks and flooded grasslands.

A sharp right bend takes you onto the point proper, and after a short few hundred metres of driving you reach the gatehouse of the park.  The day use fee can be paid through an unmanned parking meter by the entry driveway, or you can detour into the park office to buy your permit.  I used the meter, and also picked up a map of the park from the help-yourself box next to the meter.

The roadways into and through the park are paved, but are narrow.  If you meet a truck coming the other way, such as a delivery vehicle (as I did), a certain amount of shoulder-kissing has to take place on both sides.  But the fall colours along these roadways are still truly lovely, even though the peak colours may have passed a week or two back.

I saw nothing all day quite as spectacular as this tree near the park entrance, apparently lagging a week or two behind others of the same species.

Across the road from the park's Visitors Centre, I parked at a small lot by the beach, two thirds of the way down the peninsula.  The east side of Pointe aux Pins is a sandspit, but (unlike Long Point) it has not built up into any sizable sand dunes.  This east-facing beach looked very quiet and placid on this fall morning when the wind was coming from the west. 

You just have to look a little way further back from the water to see that the last sizable gale from the east drove the waves a good deal higher.

Flooding in Rondeau is fairly common, especially in fall storms and during spring high water periods.  Across the point, on the west side, even the relatively narrow width of Rondeau Bay generates some choppy wave action.

Right by the beach you will see a boardwalk traversing the marram grass which anchors the low sand dunes in place.  This is the beginning of the Tulip Tree Trail, which is the one I chose for my daily hike.  Right at the outset, the boardwalk passed next to a couple of trees which hadn't yet finished putting on their annual colour show.

The boardwalk snakes around in a curve back towards the main road.  At the road, you cross on a marked crosswalk and enter the Carolinian forest which covers most of the park.  Soon after you cross the Harrison Trail, one of two trails running all the way to the tip of the peninsula.  This sign shows that this trail is optimized for cyclists, although I'd presume that wide tires would be a must despite the lack of any hills.

 The Tulip Tree Trail zigzags its way into the forest with frequent short boardwalk stretches to cross the many shallow pools in this wetland.  The forest here is plainly a favourable environment for the growth of large vines entwining around the trees.  Their twisting strands create fascinating, not to say bizarre, patterns of natural sculpture.

Even some of the trees get in on this game of twisting and curving.

Despite this being a relatively short trail (30 minutes or so for the entire loop), the variation in density of the forest growth is striking.  Very little of this woodland is actual old growth, as it has been logged over in the past.  All the same, some areas are very open and light while others become much denser and darker.  Like any good park whose focus is on the natural environment, Rondeau leaves the trees -- and vines -- to lie where they fall, allowing the natural cycle of decay and fertilization to run its course.

It's no surprise (to me at least) that, in a wetland region like this, some of the most striking views are found on the numerous boardwalks -- seen by looking down at the reflections rather than up at the sky.

Particularly eye-catching at this more open spot was the brilliant green of the algae-covered rear portion of the pond.

Now, what about those tulip trees?  I'm not enough of a botanist to pick them out at this time of year although I'm sure I walked past some of them.  I'll just have to come back to Rondeau next spring during their flowering season to enjoy that spectacle.