Day at the Beach

We are really fortunate to be living within a couple of hours of three of the five Great Lakes. One favourite spot on Lake Erie is Port Stanley, which boasted "in the day" a famous night club, The Stork Club, and a booming fishing industry. The Stork Club was destroyed by fire in early 1979, and the fishing boats are nearly extinct. But the beach is still there, and is a thriving attraction, not only during the summer months, but as I discovered, even year round.

This view is just one portion of a huge oil container of some sort, I don't know the right word for it, but the fence in front is a good 10 or 12 feet high, and the trees to the right look dwarfed. Some of the other structures are just black and ugly, but the two that are on the beach have this much more attractive art work.



Continuing to the right of the oil storage tank, in a line directly toward the lake, is a break wall that extends at least 100 feet past the shore. In the past, it was a favourite stroll, when the weather allowed, but despite posted warnings and various safeguards, a few accidental drownings and near-drownings did occur, and so now the wall is totally off limits.






This couple is not actually on the break wall, but on the snow and ice that is banked there.




The shore line is totally obstructed by the mounds of snow and ice. There were still a number of people who were on the beach, or more likely standing on the iced-over lake, and some intrepid younger souls still attempted to build castles, of a sort. The jagged ice and frozen snow were quite unforgiving, and no one stayed too long at it.





It was a very pleasant surprise to find that the beachfront restaurant and Port Stanley landmark, "Mackie's", was open even in the off season. Mackie's orangeade is practically world famous, well, at least to those of in this part of the world!