A Visit to Toronto Island

Ken and I took the ferry to Toronto Island yesterday.  It was the perfect day for it.  Not too warm or too cool.  I managed to get away without sunscreen because I wore long sleeves and a big hat.  Hooray for not being sticky!

Amazingly, there weren't very many other people on the island.  It was remarkable. I'd all but stopped going because the crowds had gotten so thick recently.  When there aren't people absolutely everywhere, the pastoral beauty of the parkland is stunning.  (Click on any photo if you would like to see a bigger version.)

If you squint at the photo above, you can see a hint of lake at the horizon.

Gorgeous, right?

We walked the boardwalk from Ward's to Centre.  View looking out:

and looking ahead:

Centre Island is where the amusement park is.  It's all very small-scale and twee, with old-fashioned-style rides, like the swan boats.

We saw goslings and ducklings, thus:

And at Far Enough Farm, one of the attractions, we befriended some goats.

Mountain goat shows off climbing skills:

Regular goat shows off begging-for-treats skills:

We also met Billy the gruff goat, who at first scared me by aggressively head-butting the fencing around his enclosure.  I would not have willingly stuck my fingers through the fence after his display of machismo, but two brave/foolish girls did, and it turns out all he wanted was to have his face and neck scritchy-scratched.  Once they left, he turned the other cheek so that I could scratch that side.  Silly Billy!

After Far Enough Farm, we agreed that in fact we had walked Far Enough, so we reluctantly headed back to the ferry dock.  It's bizarre that such a place can exist minutes away from the dense downtown core of the city.  

Thank goodness that it does.