Currently Browsing: Cassandra Jowett

Cassandra Jowett is a marketer who works at a software startup in Toronto. Her love of the great outdoors first started at the base of the Rocky Mountains when her parents took her camping as a baby. It blossomed as an adult when Brian began taking her canoe tripping in the Ontario backcountry.

Paddling Toronto’s flooded Rouge River in the spring

The Rouge River is one of our favourite spring paddling routes: it’s easy to access and typically stays flat even at high water levels. When we arrived at Rouge Hill Park in June 2019, however, we discovered that it was completely flooded! The high water level on Lake Ontario caused a lot of havoc that year, […]

Human-caused forest fire on OSA Lake in Killarney Provincial Park

When you’re backcountry camping on one of the hardest-to-book and most beautiful lakes in one of the hardest-to-book and most beautiful provincial parks in Ontario, you hardly expect to stumble upon a forest fire on Canada Day weekend. We spent two nights on Lake Killarney, including a hike up to The Crack, before making the […]

How to go backcountry camping during the pandemic

When the province of Ontario allowed backcountry camping starting June 1st, we only had a few days to plan our first trip, already booked for June 4th to the Massasauga Provincial Park. After months of not seeing people, we wanted to invite some friends, so we devised a few ways to eliminate infection while camping […]

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Before you canoe or kayak to the Toronto Islands, read this

The urban paddling route we get asked about the most is from the city to the Toronto Islands, and those requests have only increased recently. Now that the warm weather is upon us,  Torontonians are looking for safe activities they can do outdoors while getting some physical distancing space from their fellow city dwellers. While […]

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2020 Paddling Film Festival World Premiere Roundup

One of our favourite “hard water season” traditions has become attending the premiere of Rapid Media’s Paddling Film Festival. Hosted by The Complete Paddler at The Royal Cinema in the heart of Little Italy in Toronto, the film festival often feels like the unofficial kick-off to trip planning season. It gives us permission to look […]

Urban Paddling: Paddle The Don

Every year, Paddle The Don feels like the unofficial kick-off to summer. It’s always the first weekend in May – close to Cassandra’s birthday – and we often get lucky with warm, sunny weather. Paddle The Don is a once-a-year opportunity to paddle the section of Toronto’s Don River between Eglinton and Bayview Avenues. The […]

Urban Paddling: Canoeing the Humber River in Toronto

When spring appears in Toronto in early April, it can be tempting for the backcountry enthusiast to continue hibernating until the season finally changes up north – much, much later. However, spring is actually the best time to paddle the Greater Toronto Area’s creeks and rivers because these waterways are often too shallow to paddle later […]

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Winter glamping: Celebrating New Year’s Eve in the Silent Lake Provincial Park rustic cabins

Nearly two years after our first winter camping experience at Silent Lake Provincial Park, we still haven’t made much progress toward gearing up to go winter camping on our own. Between buying our first home and paying for our wedding, the idea of dropping thousands of dollars on a decent-quality hot tent and accessories all […]

The Crothers Woods trail split into "easier" and "harder" sections at one point

Wild Toronto: Hiking Crothers Woods in the Don Valley

Wild Toronto is a series about the many wild places you can hike and bike in all four seasons without ever leaving the city. We weren’t sure what to expect when we headed out to Crothers Woods for a winter day hike in the city. But shortly after we embarked on the trail, we could […]

Taking one last look at the Riverside-Mast Trail ridge before the descent down to the Rouge River

Wild Toronto: Winter hiking in the Rouge National Urban Park

The southernmost end of Toronto’s Rouge River is one of our favourite urban waterways to paddle in the spring, and later in the year too if water levels are high enough to float our canoe. The Rouge River is rarely used by other boaters, and we often see all kinds of wildlife as we paddle […]