Toronto Star 2002 End-to-End Itinerary-594 km

1. The Waterfront Trail

At Quinte West, the Trail splits into two possible routes. One travels south through Prince Edward County, arriving finally at Glenora Ferry the second continues east along HWY 2 to Belleville, Deseronto and Napanee, where the route turns south toward the lake. We take the first option but add a side trip to beautiful Belleville.

2. Mayor Bill Findley and Star reporter Kate Harries in the Haldimand Boat Launch

We set off from the Haldimand Boat Launch located in Alnwick/Haldimand. The Boat Launch was opened in 1995 and serves as one of the few public gathering places along this stretch of waterfront. Jim Kelleher from the Lower Trent Conservation Authority, and Bernadette Murray from the Town, are terrific guides, filling us in on the local natural and cultural history.

3. Orchard Grove and Lakeport Roads

The morning ride, with its few gentle inclines, is cool and relaxing.

4. Colborne Town Hall

We are treated to delicious, fresh apple pie Marc Combes from the Apple Route. Marc also shares with us the latest map of a driving/cycling tour of Ontario's apple country-a wonderful and tasty way to explore this part of the waterfront. For more information visit: www.appleroute.ca

5. Antique shop outside of historic Cramahe/Colborne

For the first time ever on this tour, we are ahead of schedule and can afford the time to browse through a few of them.

6. Pieter Wyminga in Pieter's Appleyard

Most Ontarians rarely venture away from the McIntosh apple, but there are many more varieties to try (for example the Gala, the farmer's favourite!)

7. Passing Presqu'ile Provincial Park

Looking for beaches-make sure you make time to visit Presqu'ile Park-it has terrific wetlands, beaches and a lighthouse you can enjoy. From here we head over to Brighton Marina.

8. Lunch with Brighton Mayor Lou Rinaldi, Councillor Rose Ellery, Chris Boutilier, Director of Finance and CAO Don O'Neill.

We at the new Dugal's restaurant (613-475-4142), one of the only waterfront restaurants along this stretch. Check out the beautiful view of Presqu'ile Bay from the patio.

9. Don O'Neill and Brighton's sewage treatment polishing pond.

This amazing and innovative project is playing a key role in regenerating Lake Ontario. Information panels tell visitors how it works.

10. The bumpy Murray Canal Rd.

We approach the City of Quinte West along the scenic Murray Canal Rd. The road is rough, so keep your eyes on the road ahead!

11. Vince Graham

Mr. Graham, a member of the Quinte West Waterfront Committee, meets us about half way along the Canal and points out a new informal trail that follows Dead Creek from the Canal and takes you into Quinte West. We opt for this route because it keeps us off the busy Carrying Place Road (HWY 33). The plan is to use this trail to connect Quinte West to Frankfort eventually.

12. To Friseur Marina

The trail goes to Friseur Marina, where it hooks up to the Renaissance Trail and follows the Trent River under the bridge over HWY 2 up to the Macdonald Bridge.

13. New trail, build by the Kiwis Club

Once over the Macdonald Bridge you turn south onto the new trail built by the Kiwis Club. The new trail is the beginning of work that will revitalize the eastern bank of the Trent River.

The trail ends at Centennial Park. There is a 15km gap from Quinte West to Belleville-the only route being a busy stretch of HWY2 with narrow shoulders-unsuitable for cyclists. We drive to the Ramada Inn on the Belleville waterfront (613-968-3411) where we will spend the night after we tour its lovely waterfront.

It is 6:30 PM and the next portion of our tour will begin at the trailhead of Belleville's celebrated Riverfront Trail, where we meet our next guide Councillor Kay Manderville. With night fast approaching, Kay packs us into a golf cart for a fantastic tour of Belleville's waterfront trail system.

A lot of work has been completed, including the PreCon bridge that connects the eastern and western sides of the river. Belleville has done a terrific job of getting the community on side and securing financial partnerships. PreCon is one example, but another is the Parrot Riverfront Trail.

14. Harry Parrot, Mrs. Parrot and Councillor Manderville at the Parrot home

Mr. Parrot has donated $400,000 to help transform a derelict piece of waterfront property into a public staging area and park.

1. Carrying Place

The next morning we drove to our start point at Carrying Place, and met our community guides, Lucille Fragomeni, Quinte Conservation Authority, her son Andrew, Barry Braun and Michael Dodd both from Prince Edward County.

2. The Rail Trail-scenic, but rough

The route of the Waterfront Trail through Prince Edward County has not been formalized, but two routes -- one along HWY 33 and the other on the rail trail -- have been identified as options. We stay off-road by taking the rail trail, but after 30 minutes your wrists, arms, and butts are begging to get onto the smooth hardtop of HWY 33.

3. Lucille Fragomeni tells us about Lake Consecon.

We don't mind stopping to hear Lucille's description of Lake Consecon.

4. John Zandarin of the County

John meets us in Hillier with a real treat - local peaches! We are delighted to learn that from here, we exit the off-road trail and follow HWY 33 to Glenora Ferry. John offers a fair reminder that the terrain along the HWY is hillier than the rail trail. We take a quick vote and decide the road provides a much better cycling surface than the rail trail.

5. A quick lunch in Wellington

Wellington is one of The County's many beautiful country villages. We make plans to stop in Bloomfield to deal with some minor bike repairs.

6. The Bloomfield Bicycle Co.

We have a wonderful time learning from true devotees of the sport how to maintain our equipment, what equipment we should have and the state of trails in the County. (613-393-1060 or www.reach.net/-bbc/). Too bad we just now learned how to shift gears properly!

7. Picton, 3 p.m.

We are weary and eager to start our drive back home. Although just a few kilometers from our scheduled destination of Glenora Ferry, we decide to grab a coffee from Tim Horton's and go home! You'll notice we have pick up a new member. Trust Chair Keith Laushway started from Pickering on Saturday and rode all the way to Picton by Sunday!!! In fact, he passed us on the way. Thanks to the wonder of cell phones you can coordinate just about any disparate group of travelers. Using a suggestion made by one of our end to enders, we hired a taxi to take our group back to the start point in Cobourg where the Comfort Inn graciously allowed us to leave our cars. The $90 investment was well worth it.