Winter RV Adventures: Ski Ontario’s Best Trails

What would you rather do in Winter: Sail in the Bahamas or Ski in Ontario? I know, that’s not a fair question – most of us dream of escaping winter, so the obvious choice is sailing the Bahamas rather than freeze in -20 Celsius. But indulge me, and let me make my case. We have done both, so feel somewhat qualified to speak on this topic. Don’t get me wrong, it was a wonderful year south in the Bahamas, which I fully enjoyed, but the one thing I missed was actually the snow and cross-country skiing. So on our way back up the Erie Canal the idea of getting a winter hardy Sprinter van was born.

Now there’s traveling in an RV in normal temperatures with bug screens, you can leave windows and even doors open and feel like you are still camping. But, once you go below 0 Celsius it’s a different story, especially if you cherish the luxury of an indoor shower in your van, which we do very much. So our van has an inside water tank and can discharge grey water directly outside bypassing our grey water holding tank under the van. We have a Trelino “composting” toilet and a mostly insulated van.

We tested “Big Blue” – that’s what we are calling our Sprinter right now – on a van/cycling trip down to North Carolina and Georgia in November 2024, where we hit some frosty mornings and the first snow storm of the season, so we thought we were mostly ready for the cold. We had also gotten a more aggressive All-Terrain Tire (Falken Wild Peak A/T4W) and a suspension upgrade (VanCompass Falcon adjustable rear shocks, sumo rear bump stops and the Baja Bracket rear shock mount) to have less sway and a more controlled ride especially on snowy roads. Our plan was not to go off road, but to stick to Provincial park camping in the winter and ski as much as possible.

However, going through a Canadian Winter, even if it’s just in Ontario (no further north than Parry Sound) has been a bit of a learning curve. At home in our driveway we keep Big Blue plugged in all the time and ready to go. For now, we know we do have to plug in to keep it warm enough and keep the AGM battery bank topped up – solar is not enough in the winter, with our current set up. In future, we might switch to lithium and add more solar panels. But we have weathered our first nights at -29 Celsius and nothing broke and we were toasty warm. (3 small heaters for different spaces in the van, making sure the large garage under our bed, which holds the water tank and water heater, stays warm, and a diesel heater as back up.) Even Momo, our cat seems to approve, he likes the toasty van, but after a year on a sailboat, nothing seems to bother him anymore.

Since moving our home base to Eastern Ontario’s Thousand Islands Region, we suffer from a lack of reliable snow for skiing. When we came back from the Bahamas friends told us we hadn’t missed much of a skiing season in 2024 – global warming is making our winters shorter and weather more unstable. Even 2025 greeted us with devastatingly high temperatures for many days melting all the snow we got for Christmas. So our mission was to find good snow and groomed trails with relatively easy access to electrical campsites. This naturally led us to check out Ontario’s Provincial Park system, as 7 parks remain open in the winter.

Algonquin Park

On our first trip in Ontario we took to Algonquin Park’s Mew Lake campground, which stays open all winter and also has electric hookup, next to yurts, basic cabins and simple tent sites. There was snow but even during the 2nd week in January it was not enough to open the Leaf Lake and Fen Lake ski trails on either ends of Hwy 60 in the Park. This was more of a reconnaissance trip for us to see how we liked Mew Lake. There’s a good number of sheltered sites with a comfort station and potable water access that’s frost free. In fact, we quite liked this camp ground, there was always a number of sites available and road access is good.

Over the winter months we regularly returned to Mew Lake. In February the ski trails were well established, the roads clear and there was always room for us. We did not see many sprinter vans but lots of hot tents and some older well established bigger camper set-ups.

Both Fen-Lake and Leaf-Lake Ski areas were stunning (Algonquin Ski trail maps). The views and descents at Leaf-Lake, especially on the Pine Tree Loop, were very rewarding. The Sprinter worked well for driving the 25km to either trail area, where we could park for the day while we ski and then come back to a warm space afterwards. But there were 2 other Provincial parks, that although smaller were even more convenient for skiing right from the door of the RV – Arrowhead and Silent Lake.

Arrowhead Provincial Park
This park is just north of Huntsville directly off Hwy 11 and famous for its 1.3km ice skating trail through the forrest. Arrowhead grooms 28km of classic and 16km of skate ski trails. Grooming is very good. It’s the home of the Arrowhead Nordic club and the provincial park has a very nice visitor centre with store and warm up cafe. On the downside it does get very busy on weekends being located just 1h north of Orillia and be aware of that infamous Hwy 11 with its white out conditions. We were travelling up from Collingwood here in February and driving really was nasty. They do have some roofed accommodations and 7 pull-through sites with electrical hook-up, water fill and laundry. They also have a large waxing hut, thanks to the local ski club.

Silent Lake Provincial Park
This one became another favourite this winter, once we had received a couple snow storms with lots of snow. The rocky terrain just north of Peterborough on Hwy 28 requires a little more snow coverage before the park will send its snow mobiles out to groom and set the classic track. We arrived just as a snow storm was in the forecast and hunkered down for 3 days. The park always seemed to have open sites with hook-up although not all camping loops are open for winter camping, we found a site right beside the ski trail and let the snow pile up around our van. The next morning the sun came out so we strapped on snow shoes and walked to explore. We hiked all the way back to the gate house just to see if the groomers would be out. They were planning to but it took them most of the day before they had come by our van for the first few loops of flattening the trails. No matter, we still went out and by the time we had skied for a couple hours, they were starting to track set. Trails just got better and better after that and even the 16km Blue Loop around the entirety of Silent Lake was open. It’s a great ski with access to 2 warm up huts on the way.
Any time you stayed at these 3 parks, your camping fee would include access to the trails for the entire day (so even on the day that you were leaving the park and had to vacate your site by noon, you could still day use the park until dark.)

Other cross country ski areas we explored this year:

Kawartha Nordic Ski Club
This is our old stomping ground. We lived and breathed this club with our kids when we lived in Peterborough for over 20 years. This is one of the best groomed and maintained clubs in southern Ontario. If there’s snow, the trails will be groomed for both classic and skate. You can’t stay overnight but it’s close enough to Silent Lake and definitely worth the trip. You can find about 46km of classic, 27km of skate, snowshoeing as well as some fat-biking trails – and there’s a stadium area with shorter trails for kids and little jumps and practice areas. This is a regular ski club, so there’s a day use fee per person.

Wasaga Beach Provincial Park
Wasaga Beach offers 24km of groomed and track set trails for both classic and skate with a visitors centre and warm up space. It’s well groomed but busy once the winter season is in full swing. There is also an extra charge to use the trails. However, there’s no overnight camping.

We lucked out – our friends Christine and Pete had invited some of their friends out to their house in Collingwood for skiing. Fortunately, they happen to have a flat long driveway and even let us plug it. It was a great dinner and fun ski!

Murphy’s Point Provincial Park
This park is located in Eastern Ontario, close to Perth and Smith Falls. It’s a beautiful park but unfortunately doesn’t offer winter camping. It’s less than an hour from our house in Gananoque, and we usually have a yearly pass for Ontario Parks, which gives us access for skiing as well. That way it’s as economical as Arrowhead, Algonquin’s Fen and Leaf Lake and Silent Lake – the only downfall is the no winter camping. Grooming is done by the Tay Valley ski club and relies on this little clubs great volunteers. Of course, we became members and paid the extra membership fee just to help this club stay in existence. It’s a steal: membership fee for a family was $75 for the 24/25 season! and totally deserved by this hard working club.

Overall, we had a great season exploring cross country skiing from the Sprinter van. The best ski months were February and March for South and Eastern Ontario. Overall we skied about 475km in 2 1/2 months and only scratched the surface. We do need to expand our ski area a bit more to southwestern Ontario’s snow belt: McGregor Provincial Park also offers Winter camping and skiing and Highlands Nordic near Collingwood is also very good. And then East of us there’s so much more: Gatineau Park and the Mont Tremblant area in the Province of Quebec. We did get a little sneak peak of the Tremblant area when our friends Dave and Lisa invited us to join their family at a rented chalet for a skiing weekend just after New Years. We were able to park our van in the driveway and join the fun dinner events with everyone. It was our first experience with alpine touring which Dave encouraged us to try and my first ever downhill. We rented equipment and walked up the ski hills with our skins – which seemed a bit crazy but perfectly doable.

The downhill was what freaked me out. Too many people jumping off the lifts excited to speed down the mountain, but I had no clue where to go or what to do. Luckily, our friends Dave and Harry gave me some valuable pointers and I managed to actually enjoy my first ever downhill! But I still love cross country more, so we also skied Domaine Saint-Bernard not far from the downhill slopes. So much to explore in this area and we will be back.
Next winters plans are already being hatched…