Today it’s snowing outside. It’s practically March, but it’s as good a day as any for snow to finally show up. With any luck it will cool down and become proper snow – currently it would be more accurate if I said it was slushing from the sky ;)
Winter loveliness brings to mind a trip Tito and I took to the Leslie street spit 2 years ago – before the birth of this blog. Because the spit acts as a breaker on the east side, and because that winter was very cold, the entire beach was frosted in ice.
The Leslie Street Spit (technically Tommy Thompson Park) is a long spit made from construction refuse that extends out into Lake Ontario. It began as the place where material was dumped during the excavation of the Yonge Street subway line.
The beautiful thing is that nature reclaimed the park. It’s an interesting contrast – there are now parts that are still used for dumping and parts that are protected as an important stopover for migratory birds.
Because it began as a construction dumping ground, the personality of the spit is varied and ever changing. One beach is a graveyard for telephone poles. One is the final resting place for innumerable bank safes. One entire beach contains the remains of a building that had fluted and carved columns, you could almost pretend you were at the ruins of some ancient site.
There are gardens of rebar, a bird banding station, a lighthouse and a shipwreck. In the summer it teems with a wide variety of wildlife, and it’s a macro photographers dream.
There’s an entire part of the forest that’s been taken over by cormorants.
It’s the site of our annual first bike ride of the season. We’re always freezing by the time we get home :) Tito and I have shot it year-round, but days like this can still leave us in awe of what a beautiful spot the Leslie Street Spit is.
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