Late fall in Collingwood

Thursday, October 18, 2018

Late fall in Collingwood

Escarpment hills and the greenish-blue waters of Georgian Bay call to us in autumn and so we took our annual fall tour of the ski capital of western Ontario. It's been so long we also decided to go back to the caves of Collingwood on Sunday, October 14th.

People flying down the zip line

First of all, while you you can see splashes of bright colour scattered here and there, overall the peak fall colours are a muted, dull brown and yellow. The leaves will soon fall so get out there and enjoy nature.

The Scenic Caves Nature Adventures are open to November and have the trail of caves, caverns and crevasses, the suspension bridge, a Children's adventure playground and eco adventure tour. The mini golf, wagon rides and Thunderbird Twin Zipline (longest twin in Canada) closed October 14th, 2018. When we went last year the trails were closed due to rock fall, that seems to be fixed now. The caves are in the rocks of the Niagara Escarpment, limestone and shale hollowed out by weathering and erosion and the trail winds up the face of the mini-mountain. Admission is about $25 per person which only includes the nature trails, caves and suspension bridge. All else is extra.

Hanging 25m above the forest floor and swinging 126m long, the bridge wobbles as you walk and provides a great view of Georgian Bay and Collingwood.

Nature trails take you on a self-guided tour of 17 features including such holes in the ground as the Ice Cave, Fat Man's Misery, Fern Cave and Bear Cave plus a number of lookouts, cool caverns and a rock outcroping that resembles a Native Chief's head.

Then we drove the half kilometre journey to the top of the Blue Mountain ski lift and rode the last day of gondolas down the slope to the village. As we spent so much time in the crevasses we could only spend about a quarter hour at the bottom before we had to get back up. So after a quick dinner back up the hill, round trip for two only $37, we began our journey back to the Toronto area.

See more of fall after the jump.