Take, for example, Lake-of-Bays! Poetic, bewitching, star-crowned Wawa! The instant devotion inspired by this fascinating fairyland is, like beauty, its own excuse for being. As the visitor steps, in the brilliant sunshine of a late afternoon, upon the beach at Norway Point he finds himself within two hundred yards of the hotel. Here is a splendid dock with shelter rooms and baggage rooms, and here are porters from the Wawa, and his impedimenta having been handed over he turns to look at the oncoming sunset over the lake and over wooded islands, the colour-scheme changing in the flitting, opalescent lights, the cloud-shadows drifting over the green of island trees and vegetation, with a fringe of pine and balsam along the shores of the lake offering their refreshing shade for the saunterers { 102} and the bathers. The dancing pavilion is not far away at one end of the long piazza, and strains of music from the orchestra are floating out on the wonderful air. On a plot of verdant grass a group of white-robed children are dancing like a very fairy ring; and the western sky which the Wawa fronts is aglow with the sunset splendours.
Or, perchance, one arrives in the morning (for there are three steamers a day) in the pure, transparent light which plays such optical tricks with distance. There may be illusions similar to those that beset, and delight, the visitors to the Grand Canyon in Arizona. One stands on the brink of that titanic chasm and seeing an enticing point apparently close at hand he remarks that he will just step over to it. "How far do you think it is?" questions the habitué with secret delight; "that point is two miles away from us," he continues with due enjoyment in his companion's discomfiture. Something of the same illusions of the air beset one at Norway Point, on which the Wawa stands. This point is a favourite with an increasing number of summer colonists as the numerous cottages and picturesque camps suggest.
Not the least of a summer's enjoyment here is the charm of the trip. It is very easy, but it is also very picturesque. North from Toronto at a distance of some hundred and forty-six miles is the pretty little village of Huntsville, nestled among lakes and hills. Here begins the Lake-of-Bays region. { 103} The locality is one of the loveliest in Ontario; the lakes are dotted with islands and connected by winding rivers, with luxuriant growth of woodlands; the surface of the water is covered with lilies, the hills are dark with their sombre pines, and the entire landscape is fascinating. At this point the traveller is transferred from the railway to the waiting steamer on which he gaily steps for a sail on this unique series of lakes. The steamer glides to the end of one and enters a river; and the craft pushes on through it while branches of trees and tangled vines sway so near, on either side, that they may be almost grasped by the hand. What will happen next? one mentally questions. How will a steamer ever thread this wildwood? For apparently there is but an unmarked stretch of woodlands ahead, and even the steam launch of an enchanted journey can hardly be expected to navigate forests. Like most difficulties, however, this one comes to a satisfactory solution when another lake that has concealed itself behind a grove is now revealed and the steamer sails on.