Kanata Lakes: a mountain bike haven Test your skills and savour the scenery near technology’s home base BY ERIC BOURBONNIERE PHOTOS BY OMBA RIDERS IN BEHIND THE silicon and software campuses of Ottawa’s high tech sector, you’ll find an area known to local residents and outdoor enthusiasts as Kanata Lakes. While you would be hard-pressed to find anywhere to swim, the rugged landscape and mature white pines evoke images from the Group of Seven, and provide an ideal setting to leave the rest of the world behind for a few hours. A prominent feature of the area is a network of multi-use trails that winds around and over rocky ridge lines rising up from Precambrian Shield bedrock. Compared to the trails of Gatineau Park and Camp Fortune, the Kanata Lakes network has a surprising number of hills to climb. They’re shorter than those just across the Ottawa River in Quebec, and they will challenge the technical riding skills of mountain bikers more than a rider’s cardio fitness. Located in one of the largest areas of continuous natural landscape in the city, this trail system divides into three areas: Beaverpond-Trillium forest trails, the Goulbourn Forced Road network (across the road from the trailhead at the Goulbourn Forced Road parking lot), and the South March Highlands network north of the CN tracks.
14
OTTAWAOUTDOORS SPRING/SUMMER 2006
BEAVERPOND-TRILLIUM
For the novice rider or a family outing, the Beaverpond-Trillium Forest Trails are your best bet. Accessible from the Goulbourn Forced Road parking lot, this network consists of a crushed stone path similar to those in Gatineau Park, and a few intersecting loops of single-track dirt trails for beginner and intermediate riders. Enjoy these while you can. Some sections will disappear in the next few years as suburban housing spreads.
GOULBOURN FORCED ROAD
On the other side of the road from the Goulbourn Forced Road parking lot lies its trail system, until recently the main riding area in Kanata Lakes. Slated for development, this network consists of a maze of beginner-to-advanced loops and has no signage, so first-time riders might want to leave a trail of bread crumbs to avoid getting lost. A single-track trail
defining the western boundary runs north along a hydro clear-cut to the CN track where more experienced riders can test the wonders that lie on the other side of the tracks: the South March Highlands.
SOUTH MARCH HIGHLANDS
Generally bordered by the CN track, Old Carp Road, Huntmar Road and the Second Line easement, the gem of the Kanata Lakes trail system is on 280 hectares of land which the City of Ottawa started buying in the year 2000 (see map next page). While this landscape of rock barrens, wetlands, as well as deciduous and coniferous forest is protected from urban development because of its environmental values. Its status as a multi-use recreational area remains to be determined after public consultations being organized by the City. You’ll find the main trailhead (known as K2) at the corner of Klondike Road and Second Line.
www.OttawaOutdoors.ca
