Thanksgiving Weekend Provincial Park Tour

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I am convinced that Thanksgiving Weekend is the best time to go camping. Not only are the campgrounds pretty much empty, but the weather is usually nice and it's the peak of the fall colours. The 3 day weekend was the perfect opportunity for us to drive north to take in the beauty of the season. Our car rental wasn't the little economy car I had requested - but some fancy, luxury Chyrsler car instead. I don't like driving big cars like this, especially since i suck so bad at parking. But I quickly got used to it and thankfully didn't scratch it up.

The first day we visited Petroglyphs Provincial Park just north of Peterborough. You're not allowed to take any pictures of the petroglyphs because it's disrespectful. But trust me, it was amazing and definately worth the trip. There were lots of little snakes on the trails. Chris stepped on one or two. They were hard to spot with all the leaves. After Petroglyphs, we camped out at Silent Lake Provincial Park. We were not prepared for camping and slept in the car. It was awful. By morning, we were very cold and hadn't slept well, and were out of there before 7am. Too bad, as we arrived just before sunset so we really didn't have any time to hike along any trails. Instead, we drove up to Algonquin where we got in lots of hiking. Didn't see any moose though, which was a bit disappointing. We really want to see a moose, but I'm not willing to drive at night when they stand in the roads and risk hitting one and killing us in the process.

We stayed at a little inn in Huntsville that evening and had a lovely Thanksgiving dinner at a nice Huntsville restuarant with a patio looking out onto the river (or was it a lake?) It was so warm outside, so we sat on the patio. Out hotel room had a jacuzzi - the first time I've stayed in a room with a jacuzzi. Between that and the fancy car, it was a very luxerious weekend indeed. On our drive home, we stopped in Balsam Lake Provincial Park for another hike. 3 days, 4 provincial parks + beautiful autumn weather = awesome.

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Photos

Algonquin lake
Don't ask which lake this is. There are so many in Algonquin, lets just call them all Algonquin lakes.