Bruce Trail Hike: Day 22 Hockley Valley Provincial Park Mono, ON

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First time back on the trail in almost a month. I have been busy for the last few weekends with travels and work. Today I would be hiking through Hockley Valley Provincial park. The drive north is starting to get longer, it is almost 50 KM drive north now. Within a month or so it will likely be over an hour or so. I will have to start compensating for this when I plan my hikes.

I parked at free parking lot at 307388 Hockley Rd in Mono. This is a large parking lot across the street from Black Birch Restaurant. After stretching and preparing my hiking backpack I started my hike. It is a short 200 meter walk along the road and than you turn right onto the trail. Today was a beautiful day to hike. It was not too hot or cold and with the early morning cold the bugs were not out. I was restricting my hiking distance until I was acclimated again. Hockley Provincial park is heavily forested but not well travelled because I didn't see a lot of other hikers on the trail today. It is also a hilly park so you will be hiking a lot of up and down hills for most of it. There are numerous side trails you can take but since I was trying to cover as much of the Bruce Trail as possible I stuck to the main trail. I was making decent time but my feet were getting sore because of the relatively new hiking boots I was wearing. I stopped after 5 KM and sat down at a bench and looked at the small apple trees in that area. I am fairly certain they were apple trees but the apples were fairly small before they got ripe. I have included pictures of the apples in this blog.

I exited the park on Dunby road which is a gravel and dirt road in the area. I hiked east a bit more until I hit 3rd Line EHS and debated whether to go farther. I had hiked just 9km this time and it was another 4 KM to my car. After some mental debate I opted not to push it first time out in a month. I hiked back to my car along 3rd Line EHS and ended my hike.

Total hike today was 13KM done in 2 Hours 45 minutes. Next week I will tackle Mono Cliffs Provincial park and finish another section of the Bruce Trail.

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