How to find your next paddling adventure

North of 25°C, you should be on the water. Toronto gets brutally hot and out in the woods, even simple hikes quickly turn into a suffer-fest. I plan adventures all year round for a living and strongly believe that there's no such thing as bad weather, just bad adventure choices. Being out on the water is brilliant - choose well and it's the fastest way of getting away from civilization, you get to see more wildlife than on land and it's much easier to stay cool. So, let's talk about how to choose well.

Wilderness Union categorizes our adventures as either Local (within the city), Rural (within 90mins of Toronto, the effects of humans are obvious) and Wilderness (Canadian Shield territory, you know it when you see it.). We apply the same system to our paddling adventures.

Local Paddles

These are paddles you can easily access by foot, bike or the TTC. Water surrounds the downtown core on at least 3 sides and there are plenty of options to hit the water. The Humber, Don and Credit River are all easy to access and, in case you've forgotten, we sit on a great lake.

The Humber River has deer, beavers, muskrats and much more all easy to spot on a short paddle. It's shallow and calm enough that it's hard to get into trouble if you stay inbetween the stretch from Old Mill to the Humber Bay Bridge. Rent a (very expensive) tandem canoe from Toronto Adventures for $70 for two hours during the weekend.

The Don River is pretty gross but fun to explore if you can get your hands on a canoe or kayak and the water is high enough.

The Credit River is a super easy and picturesque paddle if you start from the mouth of Lake Ontario. Go a bit further up and you'll find a surprising stretch of white water that goes from Streetsville to Erindale. Be aware that this is too shallow to run in anything but a packraft unless there's been a heavy rainfall, in which case things can get dangerous pretty quickly.

Lake Ontario has so many options and you should really experiment yourself to find others but a few highlights:

• Paddling close to the shore sheltered by the wave breaks West of exhibition place. This route is great for beginners
• Crossing to the Islands via Cherry Beach and the Keating Channel then exploring Sunfish Cut. Alternatively, rent a canoe, kayak or SUP on the Islands
• Tommy Thompson Park (the Leslie Spit) has sheltered waters that are great to explore and have some of the best birdwatching in the city.

Rural Paddles

If you want to go a bit further out, look for conservation areas that rent boats. I've had mixed luck with this in the past because they can be quite hard to deal with. There are very few rental options this close to the city and those who do may not take reservations or charge hugely inflated rates. If you can get out of the city you're much better off getting into the wilderness for something more exciting.

Wilderness Paddles

Get 90mins or so North of the city and you have some of the best paddling on earth available to you. There's absolutely stunning scenery you can access in a shockingly short amount of time that will have you feeling like you've truly escaped civilization for the day. With over 100,000 lakes and rivers to choose from, I'll suggest some easy starting points:

• Find a Provincial Park that does rentals. Most of them are pretty well set up to offer reasonably priced day rentals. Three great options are Six Mile Lake, Massasauga and Algonquin
• Rent a canoe and find your own lake. Open up Google Maps on the area you're interested in and search "Boat Launch" or "Access Point". Voila - loads of options with water access, normally with parking. For canoe rentals, we recommend Swift Canoe and Kayak for excellent quality, reasonably priced options
• Go on an organized trip. Wilderness Union runs canoe day-trips in gorgeous locations with transport (like this one) all throughout the summer

The most magical experiences are those away from other boat traffic. For this, you'll need to get further away or portage. Some research in advance is key here. Some tactics we like to use:

- Check out maps of the area beforehand (we use Caltopo)

• Check out maps of the area beforehand (we use a combination of Google Maps, the Crown Land Use Policy Atlas and Caltopo)
• Google the name of the lake and "canoe route" or "portage"
• Browse facebook groups of the area or search for routes in the generic camping groups
• Slightly harder to use but perhaps the very best resource is Canadian Canoe Routes. You'll fall down a rabbit hole of discovery in no time

A note on getting a canoe of your own

Canoes get crazy expensive. One of the best purchases I ever made was a second hand, inflatable Sea Eagle kayak for $200. It was ugly, unwieldy and popped more than once but it unlocked the water for me. I can't recommend this option highly enough. Get something cheap and second hand and figure out what kind of paddling you like before committing. Heavy fiberglass canoes can often get picked up for just a few hundred bucks and inflatable kayaks are ubiquitous. My personal preference is for a Packraft - they weigh just a few pounds and pack down to the size of a kitchen roll. More on that another time!