Beaverton Harbour
A pier, a marina and a beach on Lake Simcoe, at the end of a village of two thousand. Sunsets here are the reason people put up with the drive.
Brock & Beaverton
The quietest corner of the GTA and the only piece of it on Lake Simcoe's eastern shore. Beaverton, Cannington and Sunderland: three villages, a harbour, and the official federal designation of Smallmouth Bass Capital of Canada.
Stock photograph. Not Brock & Beaverton.
Farmland and a lake
Feels like
90+ min, by car
To Union Station
The lowest prices in the GTA
Go for
How to say it
Brock Township, and then the village: Beaverton, Cannington or Sunderland. “Brock” on its own gets you a blank look and a follow-up question.
Heads up
It is the furthest point in the GTA from Toronto and there is no transit worth the name. If your work is downtown, this is not a commute, it is a change of life.
Who to go and watch
No club of its own.
It is a fishing town, officially. Beaverton harbour runs smallmouth bass all summer and ice huts all winter, and the federal designation is on the sign as you come in.
Where to actually go
5 things worth knowing about Brock & Beaverton.
Public places, parks, markets and the streets the independents are actually on. Nothing here is invented, and nothing here is a photograph of somewhere else.
Beaverton's Main Street
Three blocks, a bakery, a café and a hardware shop that has been there for generations. That is the whole of it and it is enough.
Cannington
The inland village, on the Beaver River, with a park in the middle and a main street that still has independent shops on it.
Sunderland
Farm country, a couple of good places to eat, and the fairground that the whole township turns out to every September.
The Trans Canada Trail
The rail-trail runs right through Brock, flat and straight, for walking, cycling and snowmobiling depending on the month.
The year
What comes round every year.
Keyed to a month, never to a date. Dates move, and a page that prints last year's is worse than one that says “September”.
July
Canada Day at the harbour
Beaverton's whole population on the pier, and fireworks over Lake Simcoe.
September
Sunderland Fall Fair
A proper country fair with a long history: livestock, heavy horses, a midway, and a truck pull.
January–March
Ice fishing season
Hut operators run off Beaverton once the ice is safe. Everything can be rented, including the hut, the heater and the auger.
HelloGTA.com
The GTA is enormous and most of it is unknown to everybody.
Including the people who have lived here twenty-five years. That is the whole brief: twenty-nine guides, and a question a week put to the region.