Toronto, Oakville, Hamilton, Brampton, Guelph and Cambridge
Your phone was in the beach bag at Woodbine, and by the time you packed up it was not
Woodbine Beach, at the foot of Woodbine Avenue, is the gateway to three kilometres of sandy waterfront running east along Lake Ontario, so tell us which stretch you were on.
A phone lost on the Woodbine sand has one advantage over most lost things: it may still be telling you where it is. Whether it can be found turns on what the map showed last, how far along the beach you carried it, and whether it went into the lake or stayed on dry sand.
Ring Seekers is a lost ring and jewellery recovery service that connects people who lost a ring, wedding band, watch, keys or phone in Toronto, Oakville, Hamilton, Brampton, Guelph or Cambridge with a metal detectorist who can search there.
Tell us what happened and where. We find a detectorist who can reach the beach or the park, brief them with your map and photos, and tell you honestly if the odds are poor.
Before you book metal detector hire for a trip back to the beach, send us the screenshot. A phone that is still reporting a position is traced through its own map first, and a rented detector earns its keep closer to home, on the deck or the patio where something went missing.
Check the phone's own map first
For an iPhone, open the Find My app on another Apple device, or use icloud.com/find. For an Android phone, open the Find Hub app on another Android phone or tablet, or go to Find Hub in a web browser. Both can play a sound on the phone, and marking it as lost puts your contact details and a message on it for whoever picks it up. If the battery has died, each may still show the last known location.
Screenshot that map, then drop pins for where the towels were, where you swam and the way you walked back to the car. For a ring, chain or keys lost anywhere else on this page, the pins and a photo of the item do the same job.
Places we cover in Toronto and the GTA
- Woodbine Beach, Toronto
- Kew-Balmy Beach and Kew Gardens
- Balmy Beach Park
- Sunnyside Beach and Sunnyside Park
- Cherry Beach, at the foot of Cherry Street
- Marie Curtis Park East Beach, Long Branch
- Coronation Park, Oakville
- Bronte Heritage Waterfront Park, Oakville
- Shell Park, Oakville
- Bayfront Park, Hamilton
- Pier 4 Park, Hamilton
- Confederation Beach Park, Hamilton
- Chinguacousy Park, Brampton
- Gage Park, downtown Brampton
- Riverside Park and the floral clock, Guelph
- Exhibition Park, Guelph
- Guelph Lake: Main Beach and Island Beach
- Riverside Park, Cambridge
- Shade's Mills beach, Cambridge
- Backyards, decks and lawns across the GTA
The lakeshore beaches and the parks inland
Toronto's city beaches, the Oakville and Hamilton lakeshore, then Brampton, Guelph and Cambridge.
Woodbine, Kew-Balmy and Cherry Beach
Woodbine Beach has a bathing station, a playground, picnic shelters and beach volleyball courts, and mesh mats cross the sand to the water's edge south of the bike path. Kew Gardens reaches from Queen Street East down to the boardwalk and Kew-Balmy Beach, with the Leuty boat house in the park and parking in Balmy Beach Park. Cherry Beach, at the foot of Cherry Street south of Unwin Avenue, has a lifeguard station, picnic tables and a fenced off-leash dog beach at its east end.
Sunnyside Beach and Marie Curtis Park
Sunnyside Park sits on the Lake Ontario shore in the west end of the city and is a popular place for picnics. A boardwalk and the Martin Goodman Trail pass through it, and the Sunnyside Bathing Pavilion stands on its east side, so say whether you were on the sand, the boardwalk or the grass near the pavilion. Further west, Marie Curtis Park has its small beach, lifeguard post and boardwalk on the east bank where Etobicoke Creek meets the lake.
Coronation, Bronte and Shell parks, Oakville
Coronation Park sits on the Lake Ontario shore off Lakeshore Road West, with picnic areas, a splash pad, playgrounds and beach volleyball courts. Bronte Heritage Waterfront Park, on Ontario Street below Lakeshore Road, has the Bronte Butterfly Gazebo used for wedding ceremonies and photos. Shell Park has soccer fields, a playground and an off-leash dog park.
Bayfront, Pier 4 and Confederation Beach, Hamilton
Bayfront Park is on the Hamilton waterfront, joined to Pier 4 Park by the Macassa Bay walkway, with an asphalt path, access to the water's edge, picnic tables, benches and a grass amphitheatre. Pier 4 Park has a beach, a spray pad, a tugboat play structure, a pier boardwalk with a gazebo and a large open lawn. On the lakeshore, Confederation Beach Park has a sand beach with volleyball and picnic areas along Van Wagner's Beach Road.
Chinguacousy Park and Gage Park, Brampton
Chinguacousy Park has paddleboats, picnic shelters, a skateboard park and the walking track at Terry Fox Stadium. Gage Park is right downtown, on the southwest corner of Main Street South and Wellington Street West.
Riverside parks and lake beaches, Guelph and Cambridge
Guelph's Riverside Park, on Woolwich Street, has the floral clock and its gardens, where wedding parties come for photos, plus the carousel and picnic shelters. Exhibition Park is a community park with a playground and picnic tables, and Guelph Lake has two sandy beaches, the Main Beach and the Island Beach. In Cambridge, Riverside Park has its main entrance off King Street, the Kin 1 Baseball Diamond at Kinsmen Stadium, and the city's Canada Day celebration, which ends with fireworks. Shade's Mills has a long sandy beach on its reservoir.
Working through it with you
Send it as it comes
Paste the Find My or Find Hub screenshot in first and add the rest as you remember it. One person reads the whole WhatsApp chat and stays with it to the end.
The time on the map
The screenshot shows when the phone last reported in. That time, your pins and a photo of the case, ring or chain go into the brief the detectorist works from.
A blank map
No location on the map, a busy beach and a phone somewhere in the lake: that search is a long shot, and you would hear that from us first.
The cost, up front
We explain the costs before any search is booked.
Where it went down
The Toronto sand, the parks beyond the city, and home.
The Toronto beaches
The City grooms its supervised swimming beaches regularly through the lifeguard season. Tell us whether you were near a lifeguard, a volleyball court, the mats at Woodbine or the boardwalk, and whether you went in the water.
Booked picnic areas and shelters
Coronation Park's picnic areas are booked through the Town of Oakville, and Riverside Park in Guelph and Chinguacousy Park in Brampton have picnic shelters. If your group had one, the booking or the invitation names it, and that tells a detectorist where to begin.
Deck boards and gardens
If it went between the deck boards, shine a flashlight through the gaps and tell us which board, counting from the house. For a garden, say which bed and what you were doing there when you last had it on.
Questions about Toronto and the GTA
Find My put my phone on Woodbine Beach, then the battery died. Is a search still possible?
Yes, and that last location is the best lead you have. Woodbine has wide stretches of sand, so a screenshot of the map and the time it was taken matter more than a general sense of where you sat. The bathing station, the playground, the picnic shelters and the volleyball courts all make good reference points for a pin. Tell us too whether the phone went into the lake with you or stayed in the bag.
I felt my wedding band slip while I rinsed my hands at the water's edge by Kew Gardens. What should I note?
Kew Gardens runs from Queen Street East down to the boardwalk and the beach, and the heritage Leuty boat house stands in the park. Give your position against the boat house and the boardwalk, and say how deep the water was where you stood. If you felt it go, you already know more than most people do.
Is the Bronte Butterfly Gazebo in Oakville somewhere a lost wedding ring can be searched for?
Yes. The gazebo is in Bronte Heritage Waterfront Park, a Town of Oakville park on Ontario Street below Lakeshore Road, and couples use it for ceremonies and photos. Go through the pictures in the order they were taken: the last one with the ring on a hand shows where the search starts, and everything after it is the ground to cover. Pin the gazebo, each photo spot and where the cars were parked.
Could my engagement ring have gone off the pier boardwalk at Pier 4 Park in Hamilton?
Pier 4 Park is bounded by the lake to the north and west, and inside it are the beach, the pier boardwalk with its gazebo, the breakwater and a large open lawn. Mark which of those you walked, and in what order, and say whether you took gloves off or reached into a pocket out on the boardwalk. A ring lost over the water is a different job from one lost on the grass, so that detail matters.
Did my bracelet come off in the paddleboat at Chinguacousy Park in Brampton, or on the walk afterwards?
Tell us when you noticed the gap on your wrist, and whether the clasp felt loose earlier in the day. Chinguacousy Park, at Central Park Drive and Queen Street East, also has picnic shelters, a petting zoo and a greenhouse with tropical gardens, so list every stop in order. If the water is a possibility, pin where you got into the boat and where you got out.
My daughter stepped off the Riverside Park carousel in Guelph with one earring missing.
The carousel is in Riverside Park on Woolwich Street, and the same park has picnic shelters and the floral clock gardens. Ask at the park concession first, then pin where you queued, where your group sat and the path you took to the floral clock or back to the parking lot.
Canada Day fireworks at Riverside Park in Cambridge, and now neither of us has the car keys.
Canada Day draws large crowds to the park, and people bring lawn chairs or blankets, so one spot can look much like the next. A photo you took that evening, with the main stage or anything else fixed behind you, places your blanket better than memory. Then pin your route to and from the main entrance off King Street.
Toronto and the GTA
Open WhatsApp while the map is still on your screen
Woodbine, Sunnyside, Pier 4, the Riverside parks or your own backyard.
Paste in the screenshot, name the beach or park, and say what went missing. For a ring, chain or keys, add a photo of the item or one like it, and we will tell you what else the detectorist needs.