Exploring the ghost town of Burchell Lake with Ellanna’s parents by a nice and warm day of May. Ontario has many ghost towns and abandoned places where nature took over. These are great locations for photographers and urban explorers. I quite enjoy them but I’m not a specialist in urban explorations.

Burchell town was my second visit to a ghost town. What I like about these locations is the history that surrounds them. 

The town of Burchell Lake was one of many ephemeral mining towns of Ontario. Since 1870, it was known that the lake’s shores were filled with copper and gold deposits. This zone was, however, isolated and far from towns. A rail link permitted the access of the site and the first mine opened in 1902 called Tip-Top. It worked until 1905. The price of copper falling, it’s stopped. With the beginning of The World War, the need for copper rose and the mine reopened in 1916 for two small years before closing again. The interest for this mining site was renewed in 1942.

But it’s not before 1954 when the Atikokan Highway arrived in this area that the mining site was used again. With the road, they would be able to bring mining equipment. The price of copper rose once again. Despite the high cost of starting a new mine with more recent installations, the mine was purchased by Coldstream Copper Mines Limited. They launched the construction of a town site for the workers’ families in 1959. Burchell town included 40 houses, a general store, a gas station, a school and a bunkhouse. Few other installations came along such as a post office, a town hall and a baseball field.

The mining finally started again in 1960. In two years, almost 400 peoples lived there. They had to bring mobile houses to provide enough home for the community.

The site was in activity until mid-1967. At that time the value of ore fell again. The mine closed and the workers and their families moved out.  Many buildings and belonging were left behind. It became a ghost town.

Even though the site is private so prohibited, it is easily accessible. The town of Burchell Lake is known as one of the most complete ghost towns in Ontario. 2017 will mark the 50th anniversary since it was abandoned.

After passing the fence, the first building to appear is the old gas station owned at the time by British American Gasoline. You can then evolve between the houses. By going inside you can see the similarity between them. Only their colours differ. Strong shades of blue, pink and orange are covering the exterior walls. It becomes difficult to see some of the buildings sometimes; hidden by many birch trees.

The remaining of a wooden boat is covered by green moss. Few meters away, a red fire-water pump stands out from the green of the trees. We then moved to what seems the town hall building. The roof entirely fell off, exhibiting the wooden skeleton. In the middle of that rotting wood, a green ceiling light is still standing; somehow intact. 

We were looking for the school building as we heard the roof was intact and standing. We finally found it between the birch trees. It’s the most impressive building on the site. Desks and papers cover the ground. Unfortunately, some human beings out there decided to paint silly words on the school’s walls. 

Our last walk was on the mining site. The whole mining installation was taken away and the underground mine was filled. On the ground, few trays hold samples of extracted ore. In some of them, gold is visible. The mining site is surrounded by trees. Few drops of rain fell at this time and suddenly the sun showed up behind the clouds. The light reflected against the rocks and the most wonderful thing happened. Gold powder from the rocks on the ground started to shine. The instant was so short before the rain hit us harder. We decided to go back to the car. That was the end of our exploration of the ghost town of Burchell Lake.

That day, the light was mostly overcast but sometimes some rays of sun would pierce the clouds and creating a dramatic sky. The perfect lighting for this scenery. I used my Canon 5D Mark II and my Nikon F3 loaded with Portra 160.