While on the road researching the south end of Georgian Bay all I keep hearing is Wasaga Beach. I listen to the radio.. “Come to Wasaga Beach”. I buy a newspaper.. “Come to Wasaga Beach.” I open the newspaper.. and I quickly read that Wasaga Beach is one of the top beaches for Torontonians. The paper says that the top rated beach by Torontonians is Sauble Beach, closely followed by Wasaga Beach. Well, my time has come.. after leaving Owen Sound I hit the road… to you guessed it.. Wasaga Beach.
Photo- I enjoyed my drive. Taking my time. I stopped in at Nottawasaga Bay and took in some scenic eye candy. Entering town there was a sign pointing down a street saying, ” Tourist area , I thought, ” That is me, so I turned. I continue driving the, so called tourist route and I see another sign ” Beach 6 “. I continue and the beach signs keep counting down to “Beach 1” or as I like to call it, “The Main Beach”, “Ground Zero”, “a Tourist Trap.”
Wasaga Beach is a typical beach community. The main strip is lined with motels, cottages, gift stores, restaurants, pubs and attractions. For some gift stores the sidewalk was an extension of their work space, as giant displays were pushing the few people onto the road so to make room for sunglasses, inner-tubes, sandals and any other beach item you could think of. Lots to buy but not many around to buy.
The Main Beach in Wasaga
The main beach was busy but no where as busy as you would think? The beach stretched for as far as the eye could see. It was clean. It was a blue sky day. There was a light breeze. It was gorgeous enough for me to park and poke around and ask questions. It is what I do well when I want to be nosy.
I parked the travel pod & paid for my parking ticket in an empty car lot (Bad sign again) I suited up in my robo cop like outfit with backpacks, tri pods and cameras hanging off me. I then put on my Sherlock Holmes face and set out to find out why the ghost town appearance? Walking the streets, up close and personal with the stores, one store after another, I noticed a majority of them were closed. Maybe that is why they have so much sidewalk space.
So I wandered up to one of the Beach Police cruising the sand on an ATV. (unfortunately it was a he and he looked nothing like Bay Watch). He told me the owners of the beach strip were in financial trouble and all the land might be going under bankruptcy proceedings. Ouch! I screamed (in my head of course). I learned that basically the town is broke. He indicated that because of greed and poor management the stores were not renewing their leases. The owners lived big and when the economy soured they were caught with no cookies left in the big giant cookie jar.
It sounded like a sad situation. Here we have a 14 kilometre white sandy beach and the owners blew it BIG TIME. I went and walked the bare streets some more and then I proceeded to back track and visit all 6 beaches I passed on the way in. They were beautiful.Vacant. But fun for some. (Main BLOG Photo)
It is a shame greed & poor management can spoil such a beautiful spot. Hope the community can rebound and bring the excitement back to Wasaga Beach before some big investor buys it up and turns it into a commercial nightmare with condos & private beaches not public.
Now I knew why there was such a big advertising push.. because the beach needed revenues. Good Luck.. but there better be PLAN B, PLAN C and PLAN D because PLAN A is not drawing in big crowds.