Hike Leader John Nourse
Hikers: John N, Jim, Margaret, Shirley, Rudi, Peter, Ann.
Parking two cars at Vineland Estates Winery we drove to Louth Conservation Area? to start hike - 11.5 kms.
Conditions were good, above 0 no wind, with about 2 cms of new snow on the ground. We started with a 2km road walk and decided to leave icers off until they became necessary. Turning on to the trail we found it snow covered but very soft underneath and sometimes muddy.
The trail took us down across a creek which was quite deep and we had to step across rocks carefully. We continued to follow the trail until we came to the Blue Jordan Side Trail (new entrance)
turning downhill, we walked out as far a St. John's Anglican Church. This ST did not loop so we retraced our steps (uphill) back to the main trail, about 2.5 kms altogether.
The trail soon climbed steeply to the top of the escarpment with views of Twenty Mile Creek some ( ??? feet below) until we started to descend through pine woods to the valley of Twenty Mile Creek. The creek was in full spate and quite an awsome force of water rushing below us. Terrain became very rocky near the creek and at this point we needed icers to safely navigate the narrow path. After following the creek for about a km we climbed a very steep set of stairs
(one hundred st eps - Rudi counted them) into Balls falls Conservation Area. The falls were just spectacular and we all agreed we had never seen them with so much water going over there.
We had lunch at Balls Falls, then continued the hike, using the road bridge to cross Twenty Mile Creek and following the top of the escarpment and through a couple of meadows with stiles to climb over, eventually coming out to the road with a short walk back to Vineland Estates and the cars.
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