(Huntsville, Ontario, Canada)
This winter, our family went on a mid-winter excursion to Arrowhead Provincial Park, just north of Huntsville, Ontario, to try out camping in the park’s new cabins. It was a fabulous weekend!
OK…truth be told, these cabins were amazing so it was more like “glamping” but I sure got ‘cred when I told people we were going winter camping!
On a January weekend, we met my brother’s family at Arrowhead Provincial Park for a weekend in their newly built cabins. They were lovely – clean, functional, roomy – and warm! And I always love when places cater to families of 5!! The cabins had a queen bed, plus a double bed with a bunk on top!
We had tried winter camping 3 years ago but the weather hadn’t cooperated (see post). We still had a great weekend at MacGregor Point, but we were looking for the real winter experience…and we got it! The temperature hovered around -20° C the entire weekend!
We arrived by 5:00 on Friday just as they were closing the office. We stopped in to register but they had already closed up shop and told us how to find our cabin but to come back in the morning to finish registering. It was getting dark by the time we pulled into the parking lot, but we found the sleds that the park provides to cart your stuff, and hauled everything to our cabin in the woods!
Since my brother’s family was still another hour or two behind us, we decided to fully unpack later and drive 5-10 minutes into Huntsville for a warm dinner.
We returned to the park and met up with my brother and his family as they arrived. The kids ran around outside in the dark while we unpacked and organized ourselves.
The cabins are perfectly equipped with a table, chairs, bench, stove, microwave, kettle, coffeemaker, mini-fridge, queen bed, double bed + single bunk above. You can choose between electric baseboard heaters or the electric stove heat – the cabins have both. While we were in the cabins, we were seriously never cold!
There’s also a little enclosed front porch where you can store your cross-country skiis, snowshoes and outdoor gear…but we chose to bring our skates and ski boots into the cabin so they would be warm when we put them on!
After a game of cards and some snacks, we ventured out to find the washrooms to get ready for bed. There is an outhouse-style toilet not far, but it was a little too cold for that, in my opinion! Alternatively, the washrooms at the comfort station were clean, warm and private. There were private shower rooms as well as a room for washing dishes. We were impressed! While we were decidedly cautious about how much we drank in the evening to avoid the middle-of-the-night pee, the washrooms were certainly civil for a winter camping experience!
So nice to know that the outhouse is not your only option for winter ‘glamping’!
We woke up the next morning to a sunny -24° C day!
We opted for easy breakfasts of oatmeal with boiling water, toast & peanut butter on our Panini press, juice, coffee and tea.
After a little exploring and playing around in the snow, we got ready to skate!
Arrowhead Provincial Park has a wonderfully maintained forest skating rink. The loop is just over 1km long and there are benches where you can put on your skates, cubbies to store your boots and fire pits to warm up.
While it is essentially flat, there’s one section that has a very slight incline (I had never skated ‘uphill’ before!). We all went around about 4 times before we felt we were done. It’s a super cool experience!
Back to the cabins to warm up & enjoy some pre-prepared lunch (soup and sandwiches – definitely worth making a few things ahead of time!), we were soon back outside for a hike to the Stubb’s Falls. I think at various times in the winter, this trail might require snowshoes, but we were able to do it in boots with no problem.
This hike was really beautiful and the waterfall at the end had several rocks to scramble around on as well as some fantastic ice formations to photograph.
After spending some time looking around there, we continued on the walk – you can choose to go back to the parking lot the same way you came or continue the loop (the full loop is a little longer – and while the adults enjoyed the full walk, the kids would have been happier to just go back the way we came!).
While everyone else chilled out with some books and games in the cabins, my husband and I decided to get out for a cross-country ski before the sun went down. We grabbed our skis and walked over to the groomed ski trails. There are many cross-country ski trails at Arrowhead Park – we chose to try the East River Classic – a beginner trail which is flat but followed a ridge with a lovely view at Big Bend Lookout. If we had had more time, we would have loved to try some of the other trails in the park.
Back to the cabins for pre-made crock-pot chili and some down time…
After dinner, we walked back to the skating rink for a magical night skate. On Saturdays, the park opens the forest skating trail and lights tiki torches all along it – it really is such a unique experience skating through torch-lit woods at night! The park can actually get to maximum capacity at the gate for these night skates – to the point where they even turn people away! But if you are staying at a cabin in the park, you are able to access the skating trail without a worry. And while it does get quite busy (so you have to be aware of the people around you) – it is such a fun time!
Skating through the woods with tiki lights to guide the way…just magical!
Having finished skating, we attempted a fire at our cabin for s’mores – but we laughed because the marshmallows froze before they could melt the chocolate cookies! It was worth trying it just to see that! Even the glow-sticks we brought were too frozen to glow!
Another evening of card games in one of the cabins – camping always offers so much opportunity for good family times!
At one point in the night, I went to the car to get something and saw faint Northern Lights!
Unfortunately, because there wasn’t quite enough snow, the tubing hill wasn’t open yet. We all agreed that we would be interested in coming back another year to go winter camping at Arrowhead Park – and try out the tubing!
On Sunday, the check-out time is 11:00 and we basically spent the morning having breakfast and packing up. As we stopped at the office on our way out to return the key, we did another little hike before we drove back to Toronto.
I totally recommend this family experience. It was a fair amount of work to pack everything up, but if you have a bin of camping equipment, that helps get you started. (I’ve added my winter camping packing list here).
It felt like such an amazing Canadian weekend!
My random tips for the trip:
- Arrowhead Park is part of the Ontario Provincial Parks reservation system…which often (usually!) fills up 6 months ahead. We were on the phone on an August morning exactly 6 months before the date we wanted to book in January. I noticed that when we were there, the entire winter was booked other than one or two random mid-week dates. I also noticed that there were 2 other families there, but most of the people in the cabins were couples. This is a great experience for everyone!
- We brought fitted sheets, sleeping bags and some blankets, but it was really warm in the cabins. I would recommend bringing fitted sheets for the beds (it’s just more comfortable on the vinyl mattresses) as well as sheets and duvets if you can fit them in your car. And of course, don’t forget your own pillows!
- Consider ski helmets for the skating trail. While I am not an expert in helmet safety and can’t guarantee that ski helmets will protect the same way as skating helmets, we found that our downhill ski helmets were protective as well as warm. Hockey is not allowed on the trail, so there are no sticks or pucks that require facemasks. My brother’s kids had their hockey helmets and they were too cold to go around again, while our kids were still toasty warm.
- In terms of camping gear, we brought our washbasin, cutlery and dishes. I would recommend bringing a little more than you would normally bring for summer camping (especially glasses) because it is more of a challenge to wash dishes. There’s no running water in the cabin so if the dishes are dirty, you have to go over to the comfort station to wash them – and that requires boots, coat, mitts, hat, etc etc.
- Other kitchen items we brought: jugs of drinkable water, a Panini press (grilled cheese, morning toast – highly recommend bringing this!), pre-prepared meals in the crockpot (eg. chili, soup), s’mores items (marshmallows and chocolate covered cookies like these). You don’t need a kettle or a coffee maker (these are in the cabin) but we brought our own coffee.
- Other outdoor gear we brought: extra gloves and hats for everyone, a spare pair of snowpants in case some got wet, hand and foot warmers, extension cord, snowshoes, cross country skis, skates (Check here for more information about the rentals at the park. Probably best to call ahead to confirm cost and availability.).
- We had an Ikea bag of gear for each person in the family and the bags fit nicely into the bench in the cabin. That way (in theory at least!), each person would put their stuff in the bag and know where to find it when they needed to get geared up again!
- Cost: $125/night + $16.25 HST = $141.25/night (current as of 2019)
- No dogs allowed
Click here for a printable packing list for Winter Camping
