Holes in the shield: the Algonquin Rock Worm

Roger LaFontaine originally came to Algonquin Provincial Park looking for creepy creatures like leeches, snails, crayfish and rotifers in the early 2000s.

During that first season in the park, he became fascinated by the huge and strange marks seen all over Algonquin’s Highway 60 corridor left by a prehistoric worm. Since then, he’s devoted at least a day per year to documenting and studying some of Algonquin’s forgotten creatures.

Many visitors to Algonquin are in awe of the rocky shorelines and exposed rock outcrops throughout the park.

What only keen-eyed visitors may pick up on are the telltale marks left behind by a fantastic creature that sadly isn’t around anymore.

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5 reasons to visit Halfway Lake Provincial Park

Halfway Lake Provincial Park features over 4,000 ha of rugged, forested Canadian Shield, dotted with sparkling blue lakes.

Less than an hour north of Sudbury on Highway 144, the park boasts an oasis of swimming, paddling, and hiking with a full service campground.

Here are five reasons we think Halfway Lake will delight family campers and explorers alike:

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Southern Muskoka’s “living edge”

“The living edge.” It sounds more like a Bond film than a trail name, until you follow it through the woods.

The Living Edge Trail in Six Mile Lake Provincial Park is only a kilometre long, but it crosses such a variety of landscapes and habitats that it seems much longer.

It also spans time, giving visitors a close look at how the glaciers impacted the land thousands of years ago. Six Mile Lake Provincial Park is small on the outside, but big on the inside.

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Mattawa River: sculpted by time

Today’s post comes from Mat St-Jules, a park interpreter at Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park.

The sights of the Mattawa River keep drawing me back.

I find incredible beauty in a scraggly cedar clinging to sheer rock or in the gleaming coat of a river otter standing on a sandbar. But, of course, these marvels don’t stand on their own.

Below the wildlife and past the trees is the foundation of this land: the geology it all rests on.

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