Visitor Activities
Algonquin is popular for year-round outdoor activities. There are over 1,200 campsites in eight designated campgrounds along Highway 60 in the south end of the park, with almost 100 others in three other campgrounds across the northern and eastern edges. There is also the Whitefish Lake group campground with 18 sites of various sizes to accommodate groups of 20, 30, or 40 people. So called "interior camping" is possible further inside the park at sites accessible only by canoe or on foot.
The visitor centre features exhibits about the natural and cultural history of the park. On entrance to the building a very large and detailed relief map of southern Ontario is on display. By this means a visitor can be oriented to the size and geography of the park. In a flow through style, exhibits continue with many taxidermied species set in their native surroundings, then progress, in a chronological manner, through an extensive collection of artifacts relating to human intervention in the park. The centre also includes a video theater, a gift shop, a panoramic outdoor viewing deck, and an art gallery -"The Algonquin Room"- with changing exhibits of art related to the park.
Other activities include fishing, mountain biking, horseback riding, cross country skiing, and day hiking. The park has nineteen interpretive trails, ranging in length from 0.8 km to 13 km. Each trail comes with a trail guide and is meant to introduce visitors to a different aspect of the park's ecology or history.
Algonquin is home to a Natural Heritage Education program. The most popular aspect of the program are the weekly wolf howls. These are held (weather and wolves permitting) on Thursdays in the month of August, and sometimes in the first week of September if there is a Thursday before Labour Day. Park staff attempt to locate a pack Wednesday evening and, if successful, they announce a public wolf howl the next day.
The park also publishes a visitor's newsletter, The Raven, six times a year – two issues in spring, two in summer, one in the fall, and one in the winter.
Read more about this topic: Algonquin Provincial Park
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