Tommy Thompson Park in Toronto

Last May - 2012 - was my first ever visit to Tommy Thompson Park down the bottom of Leslie St. What a Sin having grown up in Thorncliffe Park my first 4 years of life, then a short stint in new Newmarket in the early 70s, then back to Parkway Forest across from a baby Fairview Mall, and entering my 20s higher up Don Mills near the Peanut Plaza - what a shame that the first time I ever visited this cool and unique area of Toronto was at age 46. Well, I have now been 2 times, last May and this May. Last May, I visited it the day I got my 70-300 mm lens. What an amazing place to try it out!

Last year, it was much warmer there. Unfortunately, we didn't realize how Long we'd be there and took no water. Doh. Well, this year, we brought water. However, I did a different dopey move and I did Not apply sun screen well. My lips burnt. They seemed ok and then 3 days later, they became blistered. For 1 week they have been very sore and infected and do not seem to be healing well. Never again - it was such a stupid thing to do. Sunscreen, I emphasize, is Extremely important and that includes on the lips as well.

 Last Year's Tommy Thompson Entry

This year, it was so much cooler, and I had to bring a sweater even. We walked the whole length of the park, right to the end, past the lighthouse. We also took 2 weather worn bricks back with us, in order to eventually use them as little decorative wall shelves. I bought some cool industrial chic brackets for them.

We saw lots of cool sights! Turtles were out, there were tons of swallows, both barn and tree as well as rough winged.

We spotted a house wren, warblers, gold finches, tons and tons of white throated sparrows eating out of the blossom trees, gnat catchers, a wood thrush, cardinals and more. We also laughed at the long tailed ducks playing and making their really funny sound.

The most cool thing we ran across was half way through the walk, there was a look out over a narrow area where terns were all occupying a floating dock like thing. Terns were diving and grabbing fish and bringing them back. We didn't see nests but there probably soon will be. The cormorants were just as funny to watch, going and coming, from quite a distance, back to their row of trees which were literally filled with hundreds of their nests. On their way back, many had sticks in their beaks, some quite large branches.

We stood and listened to an amazing Mocking bird for about 20 mins. It made hundreds of sounds, one sounding very much like a ringing phone!

Last year, we ran into a group of elderly people, and one woman said "everyone says Point Pelee is the place to go for seeing birds but I think this place rivals there." It was kind of funny and stuck with us. We did run into a lot of binocular clad hat wearing persons walking the less travelled path that begins at the parking lot. We did take that first too but it was quite flooded and I was eager to get on the main path as it is a very long walk to the end. We spent in total, 6 1/2 hours that day, walking.