Ontario Parks has an initiative in partnership with Sail Outdoors (read more about it here) to take a hike on the first day of the year! You can check out the hashtag #FirstDayHike on Twitter here!
My partner and I chose to head to Petawawa Terrace Provincial Park to hike and we tested out our new Garmin GPS on the way! I used one when I was road tripping eastern Canada and it was absolutely incredible, so we’re jazzed to have a new tech member of the family!
We were both surprised to see how busy the parking lot was for the park since the roads were more or less deserted since everything was closed! It was lovely to be around so many others enjoying the outdoors with their families while being in a forest large enough that we never had to cross paths with almost anyone! Social distancing is easy in a massive forest with trails galore, haha!
It was definitely chilly, and long johns probably would have been useful, but we were tricked by seeing 1°C on the weather! We were just too excited to get outside so we made do!
We were happy there was still snow on the ground since much of it has melted elsewhere.
The mushrooms were also in fine form in the forest!
The sun also tried valiantly to peak through the clouds, so it was quite bright even though it was overcast!
Overall it was an incredibly beautiful day and I was so glad I didn’t sleep in instead today! I feel incredibly fortunate to have access to so many beautiful parks and spaces that are protected, and I hope more people have the opportunity this year to get outside and see all that our parks have to offer!
Stay safe this year, friends! I hope you’re all well!
Your friend,
Sara
Paddle and Pine 