Algonquin
Canadians are not naturally city-dwellers. Although most head to
the mountains at the first opportunity, Torontonians prefer the lakes –
retreating to their isolated summerhouses in ‘cottage country’, several hours’
drive north of the city, for long weekends or even the entire summer. For the
most part, these ‘cottages’ are cabins or bungalows, so removed from the grid
that running water is considered a luxury. So, with my family in town for
Thanksgiving weekend, we joined the melee northwards to Algonquin Provincial
Park, hoping to reconnect with Canadian nature.
The transition from urban to natural is gradual. We hired a car and negotiated the speeding, tailgating traffic which weaved in and out all six lanes of highway 407. Over time the roads quietened, until we reached the single lane of highway 60 which journeys through Algonquin itself. Our cabin stood beside Oxtongue Lake, just a few kilometres from the park’s western gate.
Algonquin is remarkable firstly for its size: the park occupies nearly 3,000 square miles, which is larger than the state of Delaware and about a quarter of the size of Belgium. It’s also the oldest provincial park in Ontario, established in 1893 to preserve the area’s beauty and to encourage sustainable logging. But at this time of year, Algonquin’s most impressive feature is its colour. Immense maples and poplars produce forests of fire, their reds and yellows implausibly intense in the autumnal sunlight. Even driving through the park was a breath-taking experience.
The trees surround about 2,400 lakes, left behind when the last glaciers disappeared only 11,000 years ago. Before that, glacial ice – up to three kilometres thick – scoured and bulldozed the landscape above the Canadian Precambrian Shield. The trees might have been around for 600 years, but the rocks below have existed for over one billion. The views from the park’s ‘lookout’ trail were suitably spectacular.
The park is a haven for wildlife, with 4,500 beaver colonies, 3,500 moose, and 2,000 black bears. Accompanied everywhere by an army of car-driving selfie-taking tourists, the closest we came to exotic creatures was Moose FM, the local radio station. But evidence of the Park’s residents was all around us – for instance in the extraordinary dam at Amikeus Lake, a vast structure built by beavers to protect their lodges from wolves. And we saw elegant bird species, such as herons, jays and loons.
For Algonquin’s human visitors, there are a range of activities from short interpretive trails to over 1,200 miles of waterways for canoeing. As we discovered at the Algonquin Art Centre, the park has also inspired artists for over a hundred years, most famously Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven. They faced criticism for portraying seemingly uninhabited landscapes without reflecting millennia of Indigenous activity, but their paintings brought national attention to the beauty of Canadian nature. To be honest, we had always thought their palettes overhyped. In reality, they barely do justice to the vibrancy of Algonquin.
We had frequently been told that Canada’s greatest attraction is its nature. After our trip, we totally agree. Words can hardly convey the scale, colour and beauty of Algonquin Park – which, although massive, is only a small part of Ontario, let alone the whole country. We loved escaping the industry of urban living for a gentler pace of life. Not even Canada’s most exciting cities left us more eager to return.
The transition from urban to natural is gradual. We hired a car and negotiated the speeding, tailgating traffic which weaved in and out all six lanes of highway 407. Over time the roads quietened, until we reached the single lane of highway 60 which journeys through Algonquin itself. Our cabin stood beside Oxtongue Lake, just a few kilometres from the park’s western gate.
Algonquin is remarkable firstly for its size: the park occupies nearly 3,000 square miles, which is larger than the state of Delaware and about a quarter of the size of Belgium. It’s also the oldest provincial park in Ontario, established in 1893 to preserve the area’s beauty and to encourage sustainable logging. But at this time of year, Algonquin’s most impressive feature is its colour. Immense maples and poplars produce forests of fire, their reds and yellows implausibly intense in the autumnal sunlight. Even driving through the park was a breath-taking experience.
The trees surround about 2,400 lakes, left behind when the last glaciers disappeared only 11,000 years ago. Before that, glacial ice – up to three kilometres thick – scoured and bulldozed the landscape above the Canadian Precambrian Shield. The trees might have been around for 600 years, but the rocks below have existed for over one billion. The views from the park’s ‘lookout’ trail were suitably spectacular.
The park is a haven for wildlife, with 4,500 beaver colonies, 3,500 moose, and 2,000 black bears. Accompanied everywhere by an army of car-driving selfie-taking tourists, the closest we came to exotic creatures was Moose FM, the local radio station. But evidence of the Park’s residents was all around us – for instance in the extraordinary dam at Amikeus Lake, a vast structure built by beavers to protect their lodges from wolves. And we saw elegant bird species, such as herons, jays and loons.
For Algonquin’s human visitors, there are a range of activities from short interpretive trails to over 1,200 miles of waterways for canoeing. As we discovered at the Algonquin Art Centre, the park has also inspired artists for over a hundred years, most famously Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven. They faced criticism for portraying seemingly uninhabited landscapes without reflecting millennia of Indigenous activity, but their paintings brought national attention to the beauty of Canadian nature. To be honest, we had always thought their palettes overhyped. In reality, they barely do justice to the vibrancy of Algonquin.
We had frequently been told that Canada’s greatest attraction is its nature. After our trip, we totally agree. Words can hardly convey the scale, colour and beauty of Algonquin Park – which, although massive, is only a small part of Ontario, let alone the whole country. We loved escaping the industry of urban living for a gentler pace of life. Not even Canada’s most exciting cities left us more eager to return.
Hugely evocative!
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