Edmond (or something or other) King Forest

N44 03.624 W79 18.509
Dad and I

20 minute drive through spitting rain. Its amazing the housing developments that are going in. The Urban Sprawl is coming!!

Parked at above coordinates and read the informational sign. Apparently they have classes here once a month for people to learn about these forest preserves. Into the forest we went, but which way to go? Pick a direction, ok here.

Ground was uneven and very annoying to walk on because it was a mixture of compressed and loose sand. Very strange for this type of forest we remarked. The paths are well worn by human, horse, and electric wheelchair alike. We even saw a kid riding a BMX bike though the forest which is not something I would like to experience. I'll take as many forward gears as possible please.

When we finally arrived at Pins and Needles (not to be confused with Pins & Needles near Old Finch) the GPS was bouncing everywhere. By walking back and forth a few times we determined that the cache was roughly 30 meters into the bush so in we went. Once inside the GPS signal situation got worse and I ended up walking in circles though dead foliage for quite some time. The clue went something like this:

Walk 30 meters from the path. (Gee thanks a lot)
Under a dead tree (double thanks)

After some more searching slimy logs Dad found the hidden cache, a peanut butter container. The contents were not very interesting and very wet so we signed the book and continued on our way.

Next up was Travel Bug Lodge about 1.5 km as the bird flew. As we walked we kept our eyes peeled for the abandoned railway line seen in the picture there. We found the graded ridge on the south side of the field and soon thereafter, the cache. The cache was a large bucket with a lid, probably the largest, and leaky cache I have ever seen. After this we went to the "end of the line" marked by the southern most point on our track there and recognized where a very old large bridge used to be. The walk back was easy because we walked along the right of way where the RR used to run.

The history of the place is better summed up in the log I wrote on the cache site.

October 10 by oldnumber7 (26 found)
Found this one very easily. The container is very wet inside with a small puddle on the bottom. The bag inside the cache has become grimy with moisture and mold will start forming soon.

If anybody is wondering about the abundance of sand on the path it is because this whole area was stripped of all tree cover for logging as late as the 1870's. Vast blow sand deserts were created in the process. Look around and you can find the remnants of the abandoned Lake Simcoe Junction Railway, which used to run right through the centrer of the parking lot to the path leading to this cache.

There is no track left after it was removed in 1928 but you can still see where the bridges used to lie as well as the raised graded rail path. Hint: One is on the south side of the parking lot where the path goes down the hill to the dried up stream bed.

Also, after visiting the cache walk a bit more south along the raised path (this is the old graded rail bed) toward the drop off where it enters private property. This used to be a huge rail bridge over a stream. You can see where the centre support of the bridge used to be very clearly.