#thelongwalktoequality

By the time the ferry pulled away from the Jack Layton Ferry Terminal, Toronto had already started to look different.

The skyline stayed behind them, tall and glassy and loud without making a sound. The CN Tower rose over the city like it was keeping watch. Office towers caught the afternoon sun. Condos glittered along the waterfront. Behind them were traffic, heat, Pride crowds, patios, streetcars, and Church Street energy.

Ahead of them was water.

Lake Ontario opened wide and blue around the ferry. The wind came sharper out there, lifting the hem of Wells’s top and tugging at Coach’s cap. All four of them looked beach-ready, but still unmistakably themselves.

Wells wore a glossy black athletic tank with a metallic gold 58 across the chest, metallic gold short shorts, black knee-high athletic socks with gold stripes, gold sneakers, and dark sunglasses. A beach bag hung over one shoulder. He looked relaxed already, like he had been waiting for this quieter part of Pride.

Coach stood beside him in a fitted black compression shirt with “COACH” in metallic gold across the chest, black athletic shorts, white socks with black stripes, black sneakers, a black COACH cap, and his whistle necklace resting against his shirt. He had a rolled towel tucked under one arm and the general air of a man who had packed sunscreen, water, and backup sunscreen.

Trey leaned near the railing in a metallic gold sleeveless athletic top with a bold black 59 on the chest, matching gold shorts with black trim, sunglasses, and a chain necklace catching the light. He looked sharp, intense, and more than a little entertained by the whole idea of taking a ferry to a beach in the middle of a major city.

Alton, naturally, looked like he had mistaken the trip for a fashion editorial and gotten away with it. He wore a fitted metallic gold KNIGHTS T-shirt, glossy black athletic shorts, gold sneakers, and oversized sunglasses. He also carried the sunscreen like it was a luxury accessory.

Trey looked out over the harbour, then back at Wells. “So this is how you get to the gay beach?”

Wells grinned. “One of the ways.”

Alton turned his head. “One of the ways? Bro, don’t make it sound mystical.”

“It kind of is,” Wells said.

Coach folded his arms. “It is a ferry. Not a pilgrimage.”

Wells looked at him.

Coach held the stare for one second, then added, “Historically, maybe both.”

Alton pointed at him. “See? Even Coach gets it.”

Coach’s eyes moved slowly toward Alton.

Alton lowered his hand. “Respectfully.”

The ferry carried families with coolers, cyclists with beach bags, tourists taking photos, and Pride boys already half-undressed for the sun. Wells watched it all and felt the day shift into something softer. Church Street had been noise and colour. Hanlan’s was different. Hanlan’s had its own rhythm.

When they stepped off at Hanlan’s Point, the air smelled like lake water, sunscreen, grass, and hot wood from the docks. They followed the path under the trees, moving with the slow stream of people heading west. Bikes rolled past. Someone dragged a cooler that rattled over the pavement. A group ahead of them laughed too loudly, one of them carrying a rainbow towel over his shoulder like a cape.

Then Alton stopped.

The road ahead of them was painted in colour.

A long ribbon of rainbow stretched across the island path, bright against the pavement, pulling the eye forward toward the beach. Red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet ran beneath the wheels of passing bikes and under the feet of beachgoers. It looked playful at first, almost unreal, like Toronto had dropped a Pride flag flat onto the island and told everyone to follow it.

“Okay,” Alton said, lowering his sunglasses. “That is dramatic.”

Trey grinned. “Rainbow Road.”

Coach gave him a flat look. “Do not start making video game noises.”

Wells laughed, but his eyes stayed on the painted path.

“It’s actually called The Long Walk to Equality,” he said. “People call it Rainbow Road, but the name matters.”

Trey looked down at the colours beneath his shoes. “How long is it?”

“About six hundred metres,” Wells said. “Almost two thousand feet. It was created to mark Hanlan’s queer history. Not just as a beach, but as one of the oldest surviving queer spaces in Canada.”

Alton’s expression shifted, the joke fading.

Wells kept walking, slower now, letting them follow the colour.

“It points you toward the beach,” he said, “but it also points backward. To the people who came here before it was safe. To the people who crossed the water because the mainland did not always make room for them.”

The four of them moved along the painted road with the city behind them and lake air ahead.

For a moment, it did feel like a pilgrimage.

Not solemn exactly.

Brighter than that.

A path made of colour, laid over decades of survival.

Coach looked down at the road, then toward the beach path. “Not decoration.”

Wells nodded. “No. A marker.”

Trey stepped carefully from one colour into the next. “A reminder.”

Alton put his sunglasses back on. “And, respectfully, still dramatic.”

Coach looked at him.

Alton lifted both hands. “Historically dramatic.”

Wells smiled.

That, at least, Coach allowed.

They walked until the trees thinned and the sand appeared.

Hanlan’s Point Beach stretched along the western edge of the island, facing the open water of Lake Ontario. The city had been left behind on the ferry side of the island, softened now by distance, trees, and pathways. Out here, the view opened wide: water, horizon, sky, and the long silver-blue shimmer of the lake under the afternoon sun.

Trey slowed.

“Oh,” he said.

Alton smiled. “There it is.”

Coach scanned the beach once, calm and unreadable. “Clothing-optional section?”

Wells nodded. “Yeah. Respect the space, respect the people, don’t stare, don’t act weird.”

Alton looked offended. “I am incapable of acting weird.”

Trey laughed. “That is the least accurate thing you’ve said all week.”

They found a spot far enough from the busiest stretch but close enough to feel the life of it. Coach dropped the bag with military precision. Wells shook out the towels. Trey kicked off his shoes and stood barefoot in the sand. Alton removed his sunglasses, looked at the lake, then put them back on like the beach had passed inspection.

Then came the beach transformation.

Wells peeled off his black tank and traded his gold shorts for fitted metallic gold swim shorts with black trim. Even stripped down to beachwear, he still somehow looked composed, grounded, and quietly proud.

Coach removed his black compression shirt and changed into black square-cut swim trunks with subtle gold trim. He kept the COACH cap on, left the whistle with the bag, and somehow still managed to look like he was supervising the entire shoreline.

Trey swapped into fitted metallic gold swim trunks with a black 59 low on one hip. He set his chain necklace carefully on his towel before stretching out in the sun like someone trying to look unaffected by how much he was enjoying himself.

Alton changed last, making a full production of it, only to emerge in short black swim trunks with metallic gold side stripes that were just restrained enough to keep him from claiming he had sacrificed for the group aesthetic.

For a while, nobody said much.

That was the thing about Hanlan’s. It gave you permission to stop performing.

The city was still there. Pride was still happening. The parties would continue later. The bars would fill again. The music would come back. But here, under the sun, everything slowed down to skin, water, sand, breath.

Trey sat beside Wells, knees up, arms resting across them. “You said this place was kind of mystical.”

“I said it kind of is.”

“So explain.”

Wells looked out toward the lake.

“Hanlan’s has been important to Toronto’s gay community for a long time,” he said. “Long before Pride looked the way it does now. Long before corporate floats, rainbow logos, big stages, all that. This was one of the places people came when there weren’t many places to go.”

Alton turned his head, quieter now.

Wells continued. “For decades, queer people used spaces like this because they needed somewhere public but still separate enough to breathe. Somewhere they could meet friends, flirt, talk, exist, and be seen by each other without always having to explain themselves.”

Coach nodded. “A refuge.”

“Yeah,” Wells said. “A refuge. But also a social space. A community space. People talk about bars and clubs, and those mattered too. But beaches, parks, picnic spots, they mattered in a different way. You could spend a whole afternoon here. You could find people like you in daylight.”

Trey looked around again, this time differently.

Wells picked up a handful of sand and let it run through his fingers.

“And in 1971, Hanlan’s was the site of the Gay Day Picnic. One of the earliest Pride moments in Toronto and in Canada. People gathered here before Pride was a parade, before it was safe, before it was accepted.”

Alton’s voice softened. “At the beach?”

“At the beach,” Wells said. “Which makes sense, doesn’t it? Pride didn’t start as just a party. It started wherever people could gather and say, we’re here. We exist. We’re not disappearing.”

The wind moved over them.

For once, Alton did not make a joke.

Trey looked toward the water. “So this place is not just a beach.”

“No,” Wells said. “It’s memory. It’s survival. It’s joy that had to fight to become ordinary.”

Coach sat back on his hands, sunglasses on, face turned toward the sun. “And it still needs protecting.”

Wells glanced at him. “Yeah. The beach, the ecology, the queer history, the people who come here. Spaces like this can look casual from the outside. Just sand and water. But for the community, they carry weight.”

A couple walked past holding hands, laughing under a striped umbrella. Farther down the beach, a group cheered as someone ran into the lake and immediately regretted how cold it was. A man with silver hair lay reading under a rainbow parasol. A younger group posed for photos, bright towels and brighter smiles spread across the sand.

Trey watched them.

“I get it,” he said. “In Miami, beaches are everywhere. But this feels different.”

Wells smiled. “Because this one has been holding stories.”

Alton leaned back on his elbows. “Okay. That was actually good.”

Wells raised an eyebrow. “Actually?”

“Don’t ruin the compliment.”

Coach said, “Correct instruction.”

Alton pointed at Coach without looking at him. “See? Growth.”

Coach did not respond, which somehow made Trey laugh harder.

The afternoon opened around them.

They swam first. Trey hit the water with the confidence of someone determined not to look surprised by how cold Lake Ontario could be. He failed immediately. Alton made it two steps in before swearing dramatically and retreating, claiming he was “built for visual impact, not lake-based trauma.” Coach walked in without reacting at all, which annoyed everyone. Wells dove under and came up laughing, slick with water and sun.

Later they lay out on their towels, drying under the heat.

Alton complained about sand.

Trey complained about Alton complaining about sand.

Coach told both of them to hydrate.

Wells watched the lake and let the day settle into him.

Around them, Hanlan’s kept doing what it had always done. People arrived. People left. People found each other. Bodies rested without apology. The city waited on the other side of the island, but here the rules felt lighter. Not absent. Not careless. Just different.

More honest.

Trey eventually nudged Wells with his foot. “So what do we call this one?”

“The story?”

“Yeah.”

Wells thought about it.

Alton lifted his sunglasses. “Please choose something dramatic. This beach has earned drama.”

Coach said, “It has earned respect.”

Wells nodded. “Both.”

He looked across the sand, then out toward the open lake, then back at the three of them.

“Where Pride Learned to Breathe,” he said.

Trey smiled. “That’s the one.”

Alton nodded. “Annoyingly poetic, but yes.”

Coach gave one firm nod. “Use it.”

Wells leaned back on his towel, the sun warm on his face, the lake wind moving over him.

Behind them, somewhere past the trees and paths, Toronto kept moving: loud, layered, restless, proud.

In front of them, Lake Ontario stretched open and bright.

Here on the island, Hanlan’s held its own kind of pride.

Older than the parade.

Softer than the street.

Stronger than it looked.

A place where people had gathered before the world was ready for them.

A place where the road itself now carried the colours forward.

A place where they still gathered now.

Not hiding.

Not asking.

Just breathing.