Lockport, NY Outdoor Activities

The rugged indoor playing field at Defcon Paintball’s Toronto location span more than 25,000 square feet and beckon sharpshooters to engage in multicoloured campaigns. For each session, players don their gear and load their guns before Defcon staffers helm a comprehensive safety course that outlines essentials such as equipment usage, the rules of the game, and how to ornament opponents’ backs with dramatic chiaroscuro. Participants bob and weave through a dirt-floored indoor course littered with concrete cylinders, ducking behind piles of sandbags as they fire 100 polychromatic slugs at their rivals.

Operating on a fully solar-powered farm, The Ajax Riding Academy sprawls before visitors a state-of-the-art facility complete with continuous security camera coverage. The academy's year-round selection of services helps novice and advanced riders alike earn their spurs, including lessons for groups or single riders and camps for every season. Owners can also shelter their four-legged comrades inside the facility's exclusive boarding barn, which features 20 large box stalls that are cleaned daily and stocked with rubber-matted floors, making it impossible for ponies to tunnel out and start new lives as bankers. During colder months, a pair of indoor arenas teams up with heated viewing areas to facilitate enjoyable riding throughout the winter.

Holding harbour boating licenses and certified in CPR and water rescue, Toronto Yacht Rentals’ captains shepherd passengers through the downtown harbour or out to open water. They pilot their small and medium-sized luxury yachts throughout Lake Ontario, picking new passengers up or dropping them off at any point along the shoreline. They ferry passengers on excursions with completely customizable itineraries and lengths, charting lake waters for night tours of the downtown waterfront, day trips to the islands or Niagara-on-the-Lake, and expeditions to find lost shopping carts.

Since 1994, the bike enthusiasts at Cyclepath have delivered prompt service and knowledgeable advice alongside an extensive inventory of bicycles and parts from top industry brands. Patrons can peruse the racks of bikes by Norco and Devinci or check out the lineup of parts and accessories by Shimano, Axiom, and Topeak. Cyclists in need of service and repairs can employ the expertise of the in-house mechanics. These cycling savants provide owners with a free estimate and a full run-down of the work that’s needed, ensuring that customers can stay within their budget or realize that it might be time to trade in for a penny-farthing, which costs a penny.

In a natural wharf provided by the Toronto Islands, Harbourfront Centre Sailing and Powerboating offers avenues to a world of unbroken horizons and wave-splashed winds. Along with education and licensing services and boat rentals, the knowledgeable navigators curate special events, such as a swashbuckling Tall Ships festival for Canada Day and annual voyages to prove the harbour is round.

From the warm-water fish habitat at Humber Bay Park to the jaw-dropping clay precipices of Scarborough Bluffs, Toronto's scenic waterfront lends itself to exploration. Power- or sail-boaters with appropriate licensing and a completist's perspective on panoramas might pursue membership for multiple voyages. With rental options for all experience levels, Harbourfront Centre Sailing and Powerboating provides a sense of freedom otherwise accessible only to boat owners and their boats' wise-cracking GPS systems.

At Nature's Photo Adventures, professional photographers—some of whom have seen their work published on the covers of Audobon Magazine, National Geographic, and _Newsweek_—guide students of all skill levels on outdoor journeys to learn the essential techniques of photographing wildlife and scenic landscapes. At locales such as High Park's lakefront or the Toronto Zoo, students learn to focus lenses on reflective waters and exotic animals. They also learn the basics of shutter speed, aperture settings, and ISO configurations as they seek out close-up shots of insects snorkeling across the Lynde Shores marsh wetlands. Along with these rudimentary skills, photo tours teach students how to read histograms and properly compose photographs with natural lighting. Students should bring a notebook and must provide their own digital SLR, point-and-shoot digital camera, or Baroque portrait painter.