My wife and I went for a walk along the Don River last Saturday. (No bikes involved) She heard that there were salmon swimming upstream to spawn. She had been looking forward to this for days.

For anyone familiar with the Don River, especially the section near downtown, the idea of seeing wildlife in the river might seem a little abstract. The water gets murkier and murkier as it heads south. I understand this is caused by the channelization of the river that increases the flow rate of the water, causing more erosion from the river bed. Something like this.

We walked for about 1 kilometre south along the river. "Tramping" as my wife likes to call it. Tramping in the woods. It just doesn't sound good.

Most of the way was along a path made by previous walkers, but in some places the path just ended so we had to push aside some branches. We would walk 20 metres, then move to the river's edge, peer for fish, see none, then move on.

This part of the Don runs under a huge iron bridge that looks almost like it's growing out of the bush.



Just when we were about to give up (of course!), we were standing next to the river when we heard a slapping sound.





This big fish was working its way up a short rocky stretch of the river. My wife started cheering it on, which I think probably freaked it out more than anything. Eventually it made it to the top, so the cheering must have worked. It swam in a few circles, then fell backwards down the other side of the river. No!

Then we saw that the fish had a couple friends. They were moving around in the pool at the bottom of the rapids, usually doing a little synchronized swimming action.



We waited for a while for them to do something more exciting but they must have been tuckered out.

On the way back, I saw this bit of graffiti. I'm generally not a fan of "tagging". It's the laziest of all graffiti. This one, however, gets extra points for matching the nearby flora.

Labels: animals, don river, photography

This weekend I was aching for some time outside. I decided to ride as much as possible through the parks and make my way towards the lake. I wanted to get all the way out to the Leslie Spit and get a good view of the city in the winter, but those plans would change.

This is along the Don River Trail, passing under one of the many bridges.


The river bank was actually sandy under this bridge. Seeing sand and ice together seems unusual to me here, just like when I see the two together in movies about the Arctic.


The tree on the right has been ringed by a beaver, I assume. If you click on the photograph, you can see a bigger version. Now that I look at it, I see that two trees on the left may have also been ringed a while ago. I think this beaver is faced with a problem I know too well - too much ambition, too many ideas, and too much beer in the fridge.


This is Riverdale Park. It has one of the most impressive sledding hills around. On my way home, I managed to ride my bike about half way up it. I had to stop because my tires started to slip and I didn't want to ride into any kids, especially since some were more crazy than Super Dave Osborne and riding on sleds without helmets.


A church on the east side of the river.


Expressway, river, bike and walking path, train tracks, road.


At this point, my bike got very tired and I had to make my way home.

Labels: don river, toronto, winter cycling