We are trying to work our way through as many Conservation Authorities as we can this year. For what it’s worth, we have hiked all of Halton region, about half of Grand River , most of Credit Valley and are working on completing Toronto Region. Of course, if we want a fresh hike, we’ll eventually have to end up driving two hours from home to get there! Alas, we musn’t forget the Bruce Trail —we still have lots of local section of that mammoth to cover.
This May long weekend was a bit of a hard one to call in terms of the weather—seemed to be hot outside when looking out from the inside, really
quite cold outside when actually testing out this hypothesis. Of course, we still hadn’t put away our winter fleece, so out came the jackets and away we went up the 410 to hike at Glen Haffy Conservation area in Caledon .
We arrived at Glen Haffy later on in the afternoon (closer to 4 p.m. ) which is apparently a calmer time of day to visit this park. The attendant on duty at the gate left not five minutes after we got there and there was just one other car in the hiking parking lot. Of course, there was about a dozen cars and plenty of people fishing around the well-stocked lake.
Glen Haffy Conservation Area Caterpillars
As it is still early season, considering that many conservation areas only open in late April or early May, we were surprised but not overly shocked by the fact that there was a small but powerful sign on the trailhead that said that the trails were closed. Since there wasn’t anyone to ask about whether or not this warning really needed to be heeded, we took our chances and proceeded with caution. We brainstormed what could possibly be a good reason to close a trail and came to the conclusion
that it must have been due to the fallen branches and general overgrowth along the trail. Really, we didn’t find it to be a hindrance as we kept a good pace along the winding and often hilly Red trail. All of the trails are colour-coded and well-mapped out in the pamphlet that is available at the gatehouse. One of the Bruce’s side trails runs through and alongside Glen Haffy so be prepared to see those famous white and blue blazes as you’re hiking. We actually got a little off our route because we were following the blazes and as we were climbing up and over a stile, we thought better and realized that we were now following the Bruce instead of the internal park trail!
Glen Haffy Conservation Area stile Glen Haffy Conservation Area shelter
We had heard about the need to use stiles to get over fences, but up to now we had never seen one ourselves.
We have been to a couple of hiking area’s with these small shelters. I’m assuming there are camps going on where they teach kids survival skills.
Walking through group camping areas and picnic zones, you can tell that this place must be hopping once the weather warms up. Fishing is definitely the sport of choice at Glen Haffy, so much so that they operate their own fly fishing club. As their site states, “membership is limited to ensure great fishing.” Also, two private ponds are not open to the public but can be reserved for groups (rowboats are also available for rent). We’ve been told that you can get in some pretty good bird watching in the park too— but all we saw during our visit were robins.
Overall, a great place to hike not too far away from the big city!
