The Passionate Hiker: Piggy in the Middle

Sun. 15 November: Getting to know Gananoque

Gananoque - a town full of surprises

This was not so much a hike as an exploration; a trip into the past.

Gananoque (pronounced Gan-A-Nock-Way), is a fascinating town beside the St. Lawrence River, with much more history than most people would ever guess. We were very fortunate in having an old friend (and member) of our hiking club, who is also a resident of the town, as our guide today.

In two short loops around town, we learned much about its industrial past, and even further back to the drama of the War of 1812. Since it would take a properly researched article to do justice to everything we heard today, I’ll let the photos do the talking instead.

A few highlights: the Gananoque River was once the source of power for intense industry along its banks, right down to the edge of the St. Lawrence River: a steel works, bolt factory, rivet manufacturers, jeep axle makers, corset works (turned over to the making of parachutes in World War Two), flight simulator assemblers, just to name a few.

The common link was the short length of railway line, called the Thousand Islands Railway, which connected the town with the Grand Trunk mainline to the north.

In the heart of town was fought the first skirmish of what became the War of 1812. The local militia leader was away at the time of the American raid, but his strong-willed wife saw off the attackers, while hiding the silver in a barrel of flour – or so the story is told.

Today a dramatic transformation has turned this industrial world into a series of riverside parks and new housing. The main park in the centre of town has a number of entertaining sculptures. Today it also had several dead pickerel lying in and beside the river, for some reason. The railway line has been turned into a section of trails which encircle the town, all the way from the waterfront up to the noisy major Highway 401 at the north end of town.

On the waterfront is a pleasant park with a kids’ play area, and an impressive flagpole; our guide explained that it was suddenly recognized that no Maple Leaf flags were flying on the Canadian side of the St. Lawrence in Gananoque, and something had to be done about it!

The waterfront is a hive of activity in summer, being the main port for boat tours of the Thousand Islands. Today we counted five huge tour-boats laying snugly out of the water, ready for the coming winter.

One other fascinating fact we leaned today: before the building of the Rideau Canal, which was opened in 1832, the flow of the Gananoque River was much greater. The huge dam at Jones Falls diverted much of the water to the Cataraqui River system to feed the new canal. As a result, from that point on, Kingston grew much faster than Gananoque.

Our explorations were in the form of two loops, with an excellent lunch stop in the middle, at the appropriately named Pig (The Socialist Pig café).

This lunch stop may have accounted for the slow pace of the second loop. But you can’t take in all this information AND rush along the trail - especially after a good meal!

Note: single-click on the first picture above to scroll through the photos separately.

Statistics:

Total Distance: 5.8+2.3 = 8.1 km (hike)

Height Gain: Say 30 ft.

Max. Elev: 104 m (341 ft.)

Time on Trail: 3 hrs. 7 mins. (=117+70 mins)

Start opp. Town Hall: 10.25 am

Arr. Socialist Pig: 12.22 pm

Dep. Socialist Pig: 1.28 pm

Ret. to cars: 2.38 pm

Temp: + 11/12C

Weather: Sunny, some clouds, SW breeze