Iain Leitch Photography

My wife's and my first car camping trip of the year was to a new park for us. We went to Lake St Peter Provincial Park, which is located about 20-30 minutes north of Bancroft. It is an interestingly shaped park with the campsites located on a peninsula, but the majority of the park is on the mainland, which has a few trails. We stayed at the park June 5-6, and even though it was a nice park, I would not recommend going there at that time of June. The bugs were horrendous and so thick that they could carry you away if they were organized enough. We also had a good amount of rain for our one-night trip, which is never fun when camping. We stayed at site 23, which is fairly open and lacks privacy on the front and one side. Behind the site is the main comfort station, which is down the hill from the site. The park has two beaches, one within the campground and one at the day-use area. The day-use beach is much nicer and bigger, but the campground one would have more privacy. The park h...

 My brother and I would always go camping as a family when we were kids. Since we've grown up, we still try to go camping together when we can, which averages out to about once per summer. However, this had all been front country camping (car camping). We had never been back country camping together before, so it was time.  When we were planning, we wanted something in the middle of where we each live. Because I'm in Ottawa and he is near Kitchener, we figured that Kawartha Highlands Provincial Park would be a good bet. It's a bit more developed than Algonquin and was only about a three-hour drive for each of us.   I left home around 7 am and got to the EV charger in Madoc around 9:20. I charged for a bit up to 88% and then made it to the access point on Long Lake around 11:20. My brother showed up around 11:50 as he hit some traffic going around Toronto.  We loaded up the boat and were on the water by 12. Our campsite for the night was on Sparkler Lake, it's a ...

 Mid-week in April, my wife and I took a trip down to Montreal from Ottawa to go see Lewis Capaldi in concert. We decided to make a little vacation out of it, as it's not often that we get the chance to head down to Montreal.  We took the train from Ottawa to Montreal the morning of the concert and arrived in town just after 12:30. It was too early to check into our hotel, so we went out for lunch at an Irish pub, that was just a few streets over from our hotel. The lunch portions were huge and very fairly priced.  After lunch we were able to check into our hotel early, which was convenient. We dropped our bags and then walked down to the Old Port, just to wander. We ended up at the waterfront, which was pretty, and then took the subway back to our hotel to relax a bit before dinner.  We went out for a sit down pizza dinner with a friend who lives in town, so it was nice to catch up with them. After dinner we headed down to the Bell Centre for the concert. We were se...

During the month of March, I went out twice to take photos, though only one trip produced anything worth posting. The second trip was more of a bird identification outing. I was hoping to add some new species to my life list, but came up empty.  The first trip, however, was more successful. The opening photo was taken at Rideau Falls in Ottawa. I've visted before on my bike in the summer, but this was the first time visiting in the winter and with my camera. It would have been nice to have my ND filter and a tripod along, but made do with what I had.  The remaining photos in this post are from Bates Island, which straddles the border between Ontario and Quebec. It is a well known spot for surfing during the summer, due to the standing waves, which is what the second photo is of. The third photo is of a Bald Eagle. I had been scanning the water for birds and the trees for owls, when my wife spotted a large bird perched at the top of one of the trees. After circling the tree for...