Harris Bay...

If you recognize the landmark rock in this photo, you are among the very lucky humans who have found ... Harris Bay.

How many kayaks, canoes, bass boats long for this perfect place?

For some of us it is a cove, an amazing landscape, that begins adventures.

It is the backdrop to laughter, friends, lovers, wading sheepdogs. It is Ontario summer. Maps, backpacks and beer. It arcs over decades.

When I remember a writer's line about "that high late summer sunshine, the lap of cool water on a hot rock and a perfect curve of time" ... this is the rock that always materializes in my imagination.

The rock rules over a lake at which there is always a wildly beautiful, rocky campsite ... waiting.

Nothing I have seen or photographed in the last five days prepared me for my visit to Harris Bay today.

I went there to photograph the landmark rock for a friend I hoped to take there. He likes rocks. It is ... or was ... a perfect place.

It was eaten by a tornado five days ago.

Can nature devour your past in a snap second?

A tree fell in this forest.

Damn.

Tornado in Combermere

Opeongo Trail Resort, Combermere ON

Tornado upgraded to Level 2

Environment Canada resassesses twister in Combermere based on photographs ... winds 181 to 240 kph

Tornado upgraded to Level 2
Environment Canada reassesses twister in Combermere based on photographs

The town was savaged by a Level 2 or "strong tornado" with winds from 181 to 240 km/h, Geoff Coulson, an Environment Canada meteorologist, said yesterday.

Based on the amount of damage -- healthy white pines were snapped off and de-barked -- winds probably topped out at about 200 km/h.

The upgrade is based on the photographs taken Thursday and discussions between a tornado researcher in Toronto and an investigator on location.

The worst of the damage was through the resort area and into the town, a swath 300 to 400 metres wide and two to four kilometres long.
--Ottawa Citizen

Combermere bay near docks and marina

Combermere, intersection of Hwy 62 and Old Barrys Bay Rd

Kamaniskeg Lake

Looking north from Hwy 62

South Kamaniskeg Lk Rd

Combermere, Opeongo Trail Resort area from Hwy 62

Brook and waterfall area, South Kamaniskeg Ld Rd

Houses, S. Kamaniskeg Lk Rd near Sand Bay camp

View from scenic overlook on Hwy 62 is stripped of most large trees

Uprooted trees collapsed on cottage and car, S. Kamananiskeg Ld Rd

Hydro crews work behind Sand Bay Camp on South Kamaniskeg Lake Rd

Combermere tornado

Combermere is about 30 miles southeast of Algonquin Park on highway 62 ... additional storm damage views of Combermere and Kamaniskeg Lake area in next 25 photos.

Combermere

Combermere

Combermere

Combermere bridge area

A summer storm....

A summer storm can be beautiful... frightening ... awesome ... powerful ... amazing ... destructive....

The road in to the cottage can be even more exciting than usual.

.. But bad things happen.

These photos were taken in Combermere, Ont, around the bridge over the Madawaska River this morning.

Obey your Dump Monkey

Some would have you believe bears prowl rural Ontario garbage dumps. Since the dumps are now gated, cottagers can no longer take their Young Ones to the nightly Bear Show, so there is no proof.

There has not been a photo of a kid sitting on a bear's shoulders since 1995.

Today, the better-tended Ontario garbage pits are under the firm and direct control of The Dump Monkey, an all-powerful figure who has seized power from the bears.

Obey your Dump Monkey.

Or feel his wrath.

Loon lake

Blog this

Okay, quit yer barking.

This is not a newspaper column,
it's a blog.
If I don't show up for a couple of weeks, it probably means I'm having fun.

(Yeah, like typing is fun? Grow up.)

Anyway, some info on my month of travels appears above.

I did not miss the bugs, the big hydro outage or the latest purge at the Sun.
Isn't it time to re-design the paper again?
Only 50,000 readers disappeared the last time that happened.
Unfortunately, another 50,000 seem to have followed them.
Half price has nothing to do with it.

Summer wheelbarrow

Clear day

Algonquin Park,

old railroad bikeway at Whitefish Lake

Sunny week

Haliburton rock

Questions & Answers

Q.
"A thousand miles from anywhere! What would you do?"
--Warner Brothers' ad campaign for Poseidon,
their doomed upside-down boat flick

A.
Not spend $200 million remaking a crumby movie?

Biking the Ottawa River

Ottawa River bikeway, Pembroke waterfront

Ottawa River bikeway, Pembroke waterfront

Aylen Lake Railroad

Come ride the Aylen Lake Railroad.

Of course, since the tracks are long gone and there are no trains, you will need a bike.

Stations...

- Frog croak holler & peepers festival site

- Snowmobile refuse dump

- Bear crossing

- Iron bridge

The baby bugs are just now being born.

Surf's up dude

Kayak season 2006 opens

Surprise!

A child is born

Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes have popped the kid.

Shhhh. Complete Silence. Oh Holy Night.

What's for dinner? Placenta.

This just in: boy or girl, they're naming it ... Carnival.

And only 20 days to the opening weekend for Tom's Mission Impossible 3. Go figure. Quelle surprise.

Hey, just walked in the door after a surprise week in Minneapolis, Minnesota and the dells of Wisconsin....

Hope the Easter Bunny showed for you blog pals and the cats didn't kill it. I hate when that happens.

One moment Peter Cottontail is delighting the children with candy eggs and marshmallow chickies....

Next thing you know some Black Calico Satan has poor Petie by the ears, another dead trophy for the mistress.

Anyway, did you know that Wisconsin is "America's Water Parks Capital?"

Me neither. They are on every corner, like jug milk stores here.

I could be very happy in The Badger State.

I am certainly half badger.

I believe it is probably the better half.

Later, dudes.

Who wants to go for a ride?

Let's go to ... Algonquin Park

MOOOOOOSE!

The snow's still deep in the Algonquin woods, so where to ride a mountain bike on a glorious blue sky day?

Only the tips of the park's bike and hike trailheads show. But the 9 km road north to Opeongo Lake has been plowed ... so happy as a clam, you can glide past frozen beaver ponds, tinkly thawing streams and retreating snowdrifts.

Bike ride,
Lake Opeongo Road
Algonquin Park

Icicle cave,
Lake Opeongo Road
Algonquin Park

Ice flows,
Opeongo Lake Road
Algonquin Park