March Break has long come and gone, and now that we’ve had a while to get back into our groove and sift through the photos of the kids’ annual Spring reprieve, it’s official: The sweetest day was our Maple Sugar Bush Hike at the Jack Smythe Field Centre. Yep, we hit up the tried and true traditional, Canadian sugar shack and it was grand!
"Sugar Shack" by Allan Edson (1872)
“Sugar shacking” is a well worn Canadian tradition, but I’ve only ever been during the winter months. I wasn’t sure what to expect as we drove up and down the huge hills to get there. The weather had been wonky for a few weeks (huge ups and downs in temperature) which left all of Spring’s new greenery and flowers in my area frostbitten, dead, half bloomed, or just plain pathetic looking (some of you may recall my Magnolia lament 
). I worried that the maple bush would be brown and withered, that the promised “friendly chickadees” would be holed up in their nests, and the kids woefully disappointed with the whole thing. I didn’t want their first maple sugar bush experience to stink – they’re half Canadian for goodness sake!
As you’ll see, however, Mother Nature pulled out all the stops and gave us a truly splendid day. I put up a teaser a while back promising this post would include “a sugar shack, mammoth teepee and some funkaliciously weird mossy rocks”. Well, read on! Funkalicious – and delicious! – are right around the corner…
(Just a few of my favourite shots below, followed by the full slideshow/thumbnails with lots of additional pics! Captions on my photos should tell the story 
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Arriving!
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No idea what kind of trees these are but the buds were remarkable
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Bud on tree
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Ava, Ben and Daddy entering the trail
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Spring was beginning to paint the place with some new life and colour...trees were beginning to green-up again
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Looking into the wood
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Tree that had recently been felled
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Mock up "person" with two cans for hands. The cans held bird seed that the kids could put in their hands and raise up in hopes of a chickadee landing, in palm, to eat. (I thought the scarf was a nice touch) We saw many chickadees, but none seemed hungry.
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Our first encounter with trees that had been tapped and were set up with buckets to catch the sap. It takes 40(!) of these buckets full of sap to make 1 small, glass bottle of maple syrup!
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Clear drop of sap about to fall into the collection bucket
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Finally, we made it to the back of the Sugar Shack! (Yes, that really is moss on the roof)
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Syrup is released through the tap and into a cheesecloth-type bag lined bucket. The cheesecloth removed any leftover impurities (or tree "stuff") from the syrup.
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After the presentation on how maple syrup is made, we were given popsicle sticks to dip into the fresh maple syrup....DELICIOUS! (Unfortunately, we were all too busy tasting to get a good shot of our "oh yummy!" expressions. With the exception of some syrup in the hair, all parties were impressed with the flavour
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The most funky moss rock we saw. At least 3 different kids of moss (completely different texture and shape!) all growing in different directions on the same rock. Each one of them even felt unique!
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The teepee is actually much larger than it would have been when the Aboriginal people lived in them (my husband, pictured, is just over 6"2 to give you an idea of it's size). It's been made this big so that visitors to Jack Smythe can enter and see a demonstration inside
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Looking down: More moss, foliage and leaves...at my feet.
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Looking up...trees and light
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Moss growing up tree trunk
The full slideshow is here:
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To enlarge any thumbnail, click on image
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- Freight train that stopped us about 5 minutes from Jack Smythe. It was HUGE. Longest freight train ever. It kept going, and going…..
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- …and going!
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- Arriving!
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- First trees upon entry…looked pretty bleak (and brown!) But there were little bits of life and colour beginning to pop…
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- No idea what kind of trees these are but the buds were remarkable
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- And so plentiful!
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- My daughter
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- My son and daughter before setting out onto the trail
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- Red tree bud
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- Loved the way the buds angled all over the place – so unusual!
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- Whatever’s going to bloom…it will be bloomin’ plentifully! Look at all those red buds!
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- Bud on tree
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- Making his way to the trail head…
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- Ava, Ben and Daddy
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- Ava, Ben and Daddy entering the trail
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- This way to the Sugar Shack!
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- My kids (daughter with her Maplelea Doll on her back) meeting a new friend
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- The first of many funky rocks covered in many different kinds of (bizarre!) moss
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- Another rock with moss (they get stranger…)
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- Spring was beginning to paint the place with some new life and colour…trees were beginning to green-up again
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- Ben, off to explore
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- This rock was completely covered in a fine, fuzzy, lime moss
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- Looking into the wood
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- We didn’t see any deer…but apparently, they’re all over Jack Smythe property
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- Tree that had recently been felled
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- Sign indicating that there were chickadees closeby. They were said to be very friendly…
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- Mock up “person” with two cans for hands. The cans held bird seed that the kids could put in their hands and raise up in hopes of a chickadee landing, in palm, to eat. (I myself thought the scarf was a nice touch :P)
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- Another funky rock with moss…totally different from the growth on the others
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- Closeup on “feathery”, long type of moss on rock
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- …And the moss spread onto logs too :)
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- Our first encounter with trees that had been tapped and were set up with buckets to catch the sap
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- Clear drop of sap about to fall into the collection bucket
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- More rock moss. This one was two different shades and not so “feathery” as some of the others
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- First glimpse, through the trees, of the teepee
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- Finally, we made it to the back of the Sugar Shack!
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- Excited to have made it “ALL THAT WAY!” (it’s really not a very long hike!)
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- Front of the Sugar Shack
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- Another funky moss covered rock at the door of the Sugar Shack
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- Inside the Sugar Shack- an industrial evaporator and tap line system set up to boil sap and make maple syrup…YUM!
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- Our gracious speaker giving a presentation on how the contraption works :)
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- Close up of tap line system and evaporator
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- Cooking demonstration by Tammy Hand–stoking the fire to get the process moving along! The steam (that smells DIVINE!) goes up and out of a “chimney” (which was really just a hole in the ceiling!) (this image courtesy of Matthew Strader)
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- Syrup is released through the tap and into a cheesecloth lined bucket. The cheesecloth removed any leftover impurities (or tree “stuff”) from the syrup.
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- After the presentation on how maple syrup is made, we were given popsicle sticks to dip into the fresh maple syrup….DELICIOUS! (Unfortunately, we were all too busy tasting to get a good shot of our “oh yummy!” expressions. With the exception of some syrup in the hair, all parties were impressed with the flavour :))
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- The most funky moss rock we saw. At least 3 different kids of moss (completely different texture and shape!) all growing in different directions. Each one of them even felt unique!
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- Close up of the other side of same rock
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- The tree tapping station set up for the kids to try
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- Finally, we made it to the teepee that we’d seen through the woods earlier
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- The teepee is actually much larger than it would have been when the Aboriginal people lived in them. This one is about 18 feet high. It’s been made this big so that visitors to Jack Smythe can enter and see a demonstration inside
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- Entering the teepee
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- Inside the teepee, this lovely lady was waiting to show us how the early settlers collected sap and produced maple syrup in centuries past. While she explained this, she was using a small hatchet to make kindling for the fire in the centre of the teepee.
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- The roof of the teepee where the smoke from the fire could exit
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- The door of the teepee
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- This bucket of sap was brought into the teepee by a volunteer. We were shown how, in days old, the sap would be emptied into a hollowed out tree trunk. Then rocks that had been heating up in the fire would be placed directly into the sap to heat it. This long process of “cooking” and reducing the sap is how maple syrup was made.
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- Hollowed out log filled with sap
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- Closeup of “uncooked” sap in hollowed out log
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- The hatchet our hostess used to hack at wood and kindling to keep the small fire going in the teepee (to heat the rocks) A large fire would not have been used long ago -the smoke would have overcome the inhabitants of the teepee
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- Fire in the teepee
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- My daughter attempting to hand “drill” into the tree to set the spigot (spout)
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- Hand drill
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- Another beauty of a tree
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- Looking down: More moss, foliage and leaves…at my feet.
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- Strange hollow in a tree
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- Craggy tree bark
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- Looking up…trees and light
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- Moss growing up tree trunk
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- Closeup of new moss forming on tree bark
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- Rock bed near creek
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- The last funkalicious moss rock of the day :)
All that sweet, mapley goodness got us in the mood for waffles and pancakes! Fortunately, I was able to find an absolutely wonderful recipe for egg free pancakes that my kids could eat (See my Eggless, Vegan Pancakes post). As you can imagine, we all ate, breathed and oozed maple for many days after!
Coming home from Jack Smythe, we stopped into Montana’s Cookhouse for my favourite veggie burger…but that’s a story to be saved for another day
In the meantime, if you ever have the opportunity to visit the Jack Smythe Field Centre, I’d highly recommend it! It’s located at 14592 Winston Churchill Blvd., Terra Cotta, Ontario N0B 1H0. Telephone number (905) 877-7771. Rates were $5 per adult and $4 per child 12 years and under.
Which of the pictures did you enjoy best? What did you do on your March/Spring Break? And (most importantly) does anyone know what the heck kind of tree that was with those huge, gorgeous, red buds??
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