Describes a 5-week backpacking journey along the Bruce Trail in Ontario, Canada, highlighting the flora and fauna of the region and providing survival tips and techniques for long-distance bsckpacking.

A new American journey.

One April morning I left the Mexico border and walked north on the Pacific Crest Trail. For five months I hiked through the California desert, the snows of the Sierra Nevada, and the Cascade Mountains of Oregon and Washington. My goal was to succeed in an epic challenge: to hike 2,650 miles and reach Canada before the October snows. It was an unforgettable summer of sunrises, river crossings, and high mountain passes; of struggle and peaceful wilderness camps under the stars. In the fall colors of September I reached the border of Canada. This is the story of my thru-hike.

Backpacker brings the outdoors straight to the reader's doorstep, inspiring and enabling them to go more places and enjoy nature more often. The authority on active adventure, Backpacker is the world's first GPS-enabled magazine, and the only magazine whose editors personally test the hiking trails, camping gear, and survival tips they publish. Backpacker's Editors' Choice Awards, an industry honor recognizing design, feature and product innovation, has become the gold standard against which all other outdoor-industry awards are measured.

When they retired, Nick and his old friend Mike both moved with their wives from Regina, Saskatchewan to southern Ontario: Nick to Dundas and Mike to Hamilton's lower city. Nick (65) had been a university professor and Mike (70) a senior civil servant, and in spring 2018 both were in need of a new challenge. Though neither had any experience of long-distance hiking, they decided to take on the Bruce Trail end to end. The Bruce, which follows the devious course of the Niagara Escarpment for 890 kilometres/553 miles through southern Ontario, is Canada's oldest and longest waymarked hiking trail. Two and a half years later, after battling rocks, roots, heatwaves, mud, ice, noxious insects, and their own mortality, they managed to complete the Trail ... in the middle of a pandemic. Was it all a nightmare? No, it was one of the greatest experiences of their lives. This book, illustrated with more than 300 colour photographs, is Nick's opinionated photo-documentary of what they encountered and endured on the long, hard, but utterly inspiring journey from Niagara to Tobermory. If these two could do it, perhaps you can too.

Travel the Bruce Trail in day hikes with Loops & Lattes author Nicola Ross Best known for her detailed Loops & Lattes hiking guides, Nicola Ross has inspired tens of thousands of people to lace up their boots and explore Ontario’s trails. In 40 Days & 40 Hikes, this adventurer, author, and environmentalist sets herself a new challenge: to hike the Bruce Trail from Niagara to Tobermory in her own creative way. In 40 cleverly crafted day-loops, Ross covers over 900 kilometers mostly following Canada’s longest marked trail, taking you with her on an insightful journey to the Niagara Escarpment’s remarkable sights. As Ross walks, she reveals stories of the trail’s flora and fauna, geology and history. The Bruce Trail becomes the central character as she ponders her role in protecting the fragile corner of the planet that, she contends, is entwined in her DNA. Despite long days on the trail, encounters with bears, ticks, and a deadly derecho, her passion for her beloved Niagara Escarpment mounts as she explores Ontario’s “ribbon of wilderness.” Perfect for hikers, non-hikers, and anyone who loves an adventure, 40 Days & 40 Hikes is both a captivating travelogue and a useful companion for those who Ross will undoubtedly inspire to follow in her footsteps.