In August, the Probus Walking Club visited the Toronto Islands. Taking the ferry from the Jack Layton Ferry terminal at Queen’s Quay and Bay Street, we sailed to Hanlan’s Point to begin our adventure.
I chose to start the walk at Hanlan’s Point because I figured that many day camps would be going to Centre Island. Here is the crowd waiting for the Centre Island ferry.
Hanlan’s Point used to be the western end of the islands but in the early 1900s, the Toronto Harbour Commission used landfill from excavations in the city to build land for the island (now Billy Bishop) airport.
I remember as a young child, we visited Hanlan’s Point with my family and there was a hotel there and some amusement devices, even a nickelodeon! (Am I that old?). All that has been demolished and replaced with sterile, but beautiful parkland. I guess that is called progress.
Upon leaving the ferry, the traveller passes by the retired tug boat “Ned Hanlan” and a statue of its namesake. Ned Hanlan grew up on the islands and was a world-champion rower so is honoured with this statue.
Another feature to be found at Hanlan’s Point is the clothing optional beach. As it was a rather cool morning, we thought a visit to the beach would not produce any shocking sights. However, the path around the beach is painted with rainbow colours that indicate that everyone, no matter what their orientation, is accepted there.
Continuing our walk, we came upon the Gibraltar Point lighthouse. It is several meters away from the south shore of the islands, a result of many years of shifting sands.
Just down the road from the lighthouse is the huge Toronto Waterworks complex that supplies safe water to much of the city.
We then came to the “main drag” of Centre Island, the Avenue of the Islands. Before 1954, this was the site of a bustling community of shops, hotels, bars and a lively scene of people having fun. Metropolitan Toronto Council decided that this should all become parkland, so they expropriated and demolished everything. Huge flowerbeds and reflecting pools and fountains have been installed but, beautiful as they are, they don’t have the life of the former town that was on the site.
At the extreme south end of the Avenue of the Islands is Centre Island beach and pier—a beautiful sandy beach protected from erosion by a huge break wall of rocks.
At this point, the group was getting hungry, so we decided to go further east to the Riviera restaurant which has a beautiful terrace and fair prices.
To get to the Riviera, we walked along the boardwalk that overlooks Lake Ontario and which used to serve the houses along this stretch which were all demolished. Nature has filled in the open spaces that were left and the only signs that there once were houses there are the remnants of the sidewalks that used to lead up to the front doors of the dwellings.
Here is the happy group enjoying their well-deserved lunch. (We figured that we had walked over 8km and taken over 12,000 steps.)
After lunch, we took the short walk to the Ward’s Island dock, catching the ferry back to the mainland. From the ferry, we had an excellent view of the Toronto skyline. A perfect ending to a perfect day.
Probus Club of Kingsway-Islington 