The Local's Guide to Elora Gorge Conservation Area | Ep. 58

 Elora Gorge Conservation Area might just be one of the best-kept secrets in Ontario’s RV scene — and we’re giving you the local’s guide to experiencing it right. Whether you’re driving in from Toronto, crossing the border from Michigan, or road-tripping from another province, this episode breaks down where to stay, what to explore, and what not to miss. 

We’re covering: 

• How to pick the right campsite (yes, there are two entrances)
• What makes Elora Gorge worth the drive
• Where locals go for great eats, hidden views, and small-town charm
• Our personal must-visit list in Elora and Fergus

🔗 Featured Links:
 

• 🏕️ Elora Gorge Conservation Area – Grand River Parks
• 🍦 Sugar Skulls Ice Cream, Elora
• 🏛️ Wellington County Museum and Archives
• 🧺 Fraberts Fresh Foods, Fergus
• 🥩 Joe’s Butcher Shop, Fergus
• 🍽️ The Friendly Society, Elora

👣 Local Tips We Mentioned:
 

• Best picture spot? Take the stairs from Victoria Park down to the Gorge and snap a shot with the Davis St. Bridge in the background.
• Want a great ride? Bring your bikes and hit the scenic Elora-to-Fergus trail.
• Pack your appetite. Some of Ontario’s best ice cream, charcuterie, and butcher cuts are right here.

Thanks for riding along with us — and don’t forget to subscribe so you never miss an episode of RV Canucks, Canada’s RV podcast for weekend warriors, road trippers, and curious campers alike!

 This episode of RV Canucks is proudly brought to you by our friends at Niagara Trailers — celebrating 50 years of helping families find the perfect RV. Whether you're just starting out or upgrading for your next adventure, their team will help you find the right fit with zero pressure and full support. Head down for their Open House on April 25th–27th — there’s something for everyone, including hot dogs for the kids and full walk-throughs of every unit on the lot. Learn more at niagaratrailers.com and tell them the RV Canucks sent you! 
 

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Transcript

Speaker 0 (0s): We're Dan and Melina. The RV Canucks, Canada's RV podcast where Weekend warriors roaming coast to coast and beyond in our 29 foot travel trailer. Stick with us for part-time travels and full-time adventure this season, sponsored by Niagara Trailers.

Speaker 1 (15s): If you're not from southwestern Ontario, Elora Gorge might not be on your radar yet, but it should be With Towering Cliffs, scenic Rivers, and a charming town packed with The Local gems, it's the kind of place worth crossing provinces or borders to get to. In this episode, we're sharing exactly how to do it right from the best campsites to the spots only locals know about. Welcome to episode 58, the Locals guide to the All Laura Gorge Conservation area. Dan wrote the show notes for today's episode, so I have to read the intro that says, welcome to the RV Connects podcast.

I'm Molina and this is my amazing husband, Dan. Hi.

Speaker 2 (54s): I am amazing Dan,

Speaker 1 (55s): Who gets me ice cream when I'm grumpy and cleans the kitchen like a pro. So thanks for doing the show notes today, Dan.

Speaker 2 (1m 3s): Well, in fairness, I put together the show notes, but Molina came to supplement them with something a little bit more concise and flushed out a little bit of details.

Speaker 1 (1m 14s): Right. So before we get into this, I'm excited to talk about it. We don't generally talk about parks that are super local to us because we, it's local to us.

Speaker 2 (1m 25s): Yeah, it feels like, why wouldn't you know that? Or that's just a weekend park. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (1m 29s): But before we get to that, we wanna talk about our weeks so far. 'cause I think it's been a very busy one. It's been a very good one. And you know, we like to take vacation time from work to spend with friends. And on Monday, Dan And I took vacation time from work to spend with friends at Niagara Trailers and we drove down and they literally handed us a golf cart at Go have fun. So we have a ton of walkthroughs of brand new units to talk about and share on our socials over the next couple of weeks.

And I was actually pretty impressed with a lot of the layouts and some of them I don't even think we had seen in recent shows that we've gone to. But it was a really, really good experience.

Speaker 2 (2m 7s): It was, my trailers is laid out really well, so it's easy to get to off the highway the way they've laid out the trailers. And this seems like there's lots of space between each trailer. And what that means is you can walk up both sides of the trailer, you can get in there and look at all the storage on both sides of the trailer. Most importantly, you can go onto the street side or the driver's side of the trailer and look at the numbers and that's easy. The other thing I would say is they've got a price clearly put on the, the nose of the trailer on the very front so you know what the price point of that trailer is.

And then they've grouped everything by brand. Yeah. So, you know, all your, all of a particular type of brand are, are together. And so what that lets you do is go to a brand, figure out what your price point is, and then look a whole bunch of different floor plans of what that brand's like. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (2m 55s): And I

Speaker 2 (2m 55s): Or what that brand has to offer.

Speaker 1 (2m 57s): I think it's great, you know, ha having that pricing information like allows you to like, don't get into that. It's, it's a really responsible way to do it, I think. 'cause you don't get into that, you know, buyer's thing where you go in and you fall in love with something that clearly is, you know, thousands of dollars outside of your budget. It allows you to shop for something that you really need that's in your budget. And then just focus on the floor plans that make sense for your family, which I really love. Everybody was like all hands on deck when we were there. They were all getting ready for their spring open house, which is April 25th to 27th.

And there was a ton of activity going on.

Speaker 2 (3m 31s): Yeah. It was like a buzz of activity. They're doing some little bit of work on the front entrance there. There'd be like a new patio going in. Like even like they were delivering park model units. Two tractor trailers came in and you know, Dan did the old, you know, toot toot toot with his hand. And the, the track, the truck drivers were more than obliging to toot the horn and smiles and waves and like it was busy. People are picking up trailers, like there's some excitement out there for sure. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (4m 1s): Yeah. It was really good.

Speaker 2 (4m 3s): Yeah. So I mean I think the, the open house will be great. Bring your kids, come on down, they're gonna have hot dogs there. It's definitely worth the trip. I would say go down, see some trailers, get some information. Hey, maybe even squeeze in a trip to the falls in a local winery while you're down there and make a great day out of it for the whole family. And I, you know, kids are welcome there 'cause kids are part of the RV experience.

Speaker 1 (4m 25s): Absolutely. We'll definitely be there on the open house day, so if you are too, come say hello, come find us.

Speaker 2 (4m 30s): Yeah.

Speaker 1 (4m 31s): All right, so let's talk about the Elora Gorge conservation era.

Speaker 2 (4m 35s): So when I put the show notes together for this one, it, this could have been a Battle of the Parks contestant, but I didn't really think it was right to do it as a battle of the parks contestant. 'cause we we're, we're gonna talk a little bit more about the area in a little bit more depth. I mean we are gonna talk about the park itself for sure, but there's a lot of unique information around the area that we wanna talk about. The other thing I wanted to get across on this is we travel out west, we're planning to head out east.

We've done, you know, route 66, like we've done a lot of big trips And I think what we don't often realize is there's people in other parts of Canada and North America where this area could be their big trip. And so I think we kind of wanted to frame it up that way and talk about this area as a potential destination for people that are coming in. Maybe you're coming in from the Maritimes, maybe you're coming in from Western Canada up from the States. Maybe this is your destination. So we would typically think of this as a place to go when you wanna squeeze in a quick weekend trip or maybe you live in southwestern Ontario and you wanna make an extra long weekend.

This is a trip, but, and we're gonna give you information for that. But what we're really gonna do is give you some more information if this is part of a, a bigger trip to Southwestern Ontario where you're gonna come through and and see the area. So I think that's kind of where we're going going with this. It's a park for all different types of travelers. Whether it's a weekend or a, a big road trip. It's, it's, it's in the town of Aor Allora is part of Centre Wellington. And so you're like, well why would he say that? It's two different places. Center Wellington is principally composed of Fergus-Elora.

They have the same mayor, the mayor of Center Wellington. And I tell you that because if you're gonna do a little bit of research on say the tourism site, your Google search is probably gonna start with Centre Wellington. The really important takeaway to say is that all Aurora is a beautiful town and it's centrally located to Fergus all Aurora, Guelph, Cambridge Kitchen or Waterloo. So it's a really centrally located to a bunch of different places. Even say St. Jacobs, which is just north of Kitchen or Waterloo.

Speaker 1 (6m 42s): Yeah. And I would say if you are coming from afar and you would like to make this sort of a home base for your travels, you are in Niagara Falls in an hour and a half. You can be in Toronto in an hour, hour and a half. You can go up to like Huron in an hour and a half. It's really centrally located for a lot of other really good tourist destinations in the province.

Speaker 2 (6m 59s): Yeah. So, you know, people from Toronto will make this a day trip destination for themselves, which means if you're camping there, you could make Toronto your day trip, day trip destination. I'll also just give a quick thing in here. Don't confuse it with the Elora quarry, which is a day use swimming quarry run by the same agency maybe two, three minutes away, but they're, they're different parks and so don't confuse the two when, when you're maybe doing your research. Yeah. So do you wanna get down to the park details?

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (7m 29s): So it's one of our favorite campgrounds. I think it's, it's a great size. It's really hospitable. There's a lot of things to do there. There's a good amount of nature there. There's you know, water activities and hiking. There's 450 sites total, so not a bad size for a park. There's about 250 unserviced sites, 130 sites with 15 and 30 amp with water. There is 20 sites that are just 15 amp only. And then there is fully serviced with, with sewer like full hookups and there's 60 sites there.

And that's sort of in the, we've talked about this, the area before, it's sort of in like a new loop. So some of the landscaping between sites is almost non-existent. But we do stay there because we appreciate having the, the full fully service sites. There is a group, there's one group camping spot there, but it is specifically just for registered youth groups. So if you're looking for a group camping spot, you're going to have to have just a reservation that includes a couple of sites close together. There is radio free zones, sites 2 46 to three 20 are radio free and there is flesh toilets, coin operated showers throughout the park.

One thing I would say about this park is that they have an alcohol ban all year. And traditionally I think it has for obvious reasons, right, it's, it's literally on the edge of a gorge. So alcohol, camping, tripping and a big gorge do not equal a safe camping trip for anybody. So they do have just chosen to throw a ban in the entire season.

Speaker 2 (9m 7s): Yeah. And I think maybe sometimes that surprises people when they arrive. I think the benefit to that is it keeps the park kind of quiet and it means it's not a party park. And so that lets you know the park staff, if you're not behaving yourself have you removed from the park. And I don't think I've ever seen that happen. And I've also never seen the park kind of get outta hand for the five or six times that we've been there. It's been a pretty non-eventful from a a party side of it.

Speaker 1 (9m 33s): So interestingly they also have a seasonal camp area there. It's called the Pines Campground. And so it's sort of adjacent to the fully service sites, but it's actually a really lovely spot if it, and they're, I remember we looked at their rates a couple of years ago and they're pretty reasonable for a seasonal site because it's run by the conservation. So if you're into that, something to look into as opposed to like a traditional RV park as well.

Speaker 2 (9m 58s): And it's really small seasonal area. It's just really located on one small stretch of road that's only a couple hundred meters long.

Speaker 1 (10m 5s): So something to note, which we should probably start with is that the park is sort of split in two by the gorge and by the river. So there's a foot bridge between the two areas, but you can't actually drive across from, you know, say campsite A to campsite H or camp area H. So if you are going there and you are staying in sort of the unserviced more wooded sites or the gorge sites, you're going to go to the gate the main gatehouse, which is located on county road 21. Otherwise you're going to go, if you're staying in the surface sites to the entrance off Middlebrook road, which is kind of like quite a bit away, it's like a 10 minute drive away.

So be wary of like which gatehouse you need to use to get into your reserve site.

Speaker 2 (10m 48s): Yeah. So we used to camp at this campground when I was a kid, the little pedestrian bridge that goes across the Grand River. You used to be able to drive your truck and trailer across that. And so the first time I went back to it and as an adult I didn't even think about which entrance I was going to use because there only was one entrance. The original entrance of course I showed up, I didn't look ahead and they turned me around and got me pointed the right way. It was all cool but you know, make sure you know which entrance you're going to use 'cause it'll, you know, save you 10 or 15 minutes.

Elora's in a really scenic area. It's a popular day trip destination. I would describe Elora on the same level as say Niagara on the lake. Very quaint village. It's got lots of unique shops, it's got lots of restaurants, it's got the Elora mill which has lots of weddings. And so there's a couple different aspects to this town. First is there's a posh side to this town. You know, it's not uncommon to go down there on a, you know, a a summer weekend and see Ferrari and Porsches and people walking around.

And then on the other side of the coin there is, you know, independently operated pubs with their own unique menu that are pretty casual and pretty relaxing. So the point I'm trying to say is it's got a lot for everyone. It's really interesting town, but can also get really busy. So that's kind of one of the things you want to know about the town is trying to help with that. So there's some shuttle services that operate between Ferguson AOR and you can look that up on their town's website And I would encourage you to look ahead because it changes somewhat frequently.

They'll adjust to demand. So I don't wanna give you information here and then have that information be wrong. The other thing I would say is once you get to the town and you get settled, Whether you took a shuttle bus or whether you've parked and walked, you can walk everywhere. You don't need to, you know, keep moving your car around, you're parked, you walk around, you see what you wanna do, you have your meal, you do your stuff and then you move along. I think probably there's a little bit more shopping and a little bit more going on in aor. I think Fergus is a little bit quieter.

It's got some great restaurants. Fergus is where you've got some of your services. So that's where you're gonna find your Canadian tire, your Walmart grocery store, stuff like that. If you need to scoot out and get some supplies, let's maybe talk about the Google review. So Google gives this a 4.3 out of five. I would say the Google reviews are are dominated by four and five stars and they're really glowing. But maybe we'll do a little bit of a back and forth. 'cause I got a bit of a chuckle when I was doing this. So let me read this one out and I'll start with the bad review was a one star, I had a terrible experience tubing at the Allure gorge conservation area.

It was an absolute disaster from start to finish. First there were no lockers available to keep our belongings safe. The equipment provided was in bad condition, bad condition, smelly, and the tubes constantly lost air. The worst part was I lost my tube, I was left stranded in the water without any assistance. To make matters worse, I was told the rescue services would incur an additional cost. It felt like they were more interested in making money than ensuring the safety and enjoyment of their visitors. I highly recommend avoid tubing here, save your money and go somewhere else that prioritizes customer service and safety.

So this person obviously did not have a good experience

Speaker 1 (14m 6s): Rescue services for what though?

Speaker 2 (14m 9s): Well, so if you live in this area, it's not uncommon for the fire department to have to rescue people out of the gorge. And I don't mean specifically just to the conservation area, I mean the gorge in general. So I think that might be what the person is referring to.

Speaker 1 (14m 22s): I think in this particular case though, if you lose your tube on that river, it's not incredibly deep. Well, so I think this is a case of perhaps lost the tube tube got away from her. Maybe the, maybe the, there are waterfalls, right? Like you have to, you have to get out at the end of the tubing and there's several areas you could sort of tube, but within the conservation area itself, you do need to get out at the designated spot. So maybe somebody had to go retrieve that tube. But I think this is one of those cases where you're going to be in water, it's run by a conservation area.

It's not a waterpark where you would have a locker where you could keep your backpack. So you know, having a waterproof bag that you can keep your things in is probably beneficial.

Speaker 2 (15m 4s): Y yeah and like let's remember Whether you tube with somebody who provides the service or you YouTube yourself, ultimately you have to get back to where you started. And so that usually involves walking. Yeah. Unless you've parked two cars and arrange that yourself in this particular case, you're going to have to walk back to the start. I feel like the walk is probably about 1.3 kilometers maybe gonna take you 20 minutes. And they tell you and they, they suggest that you bring proper footwear to do that walk. Yeah. So you know, if you've spent your time going down the river, you're a little bit tired.

I can understand how somebody's gonna get a little bit, you know, cranky if they have to walk, you know, 1.3 kilometers back to where you started. But I like the river doesn't run in a circle so I don't know how to crack that nut. It's not a lazy river, it's not a lazy river, it's a river.

Speaker 1 (15m 53s): Yeah. And you know, so that's listen, put some delicious granola bars in your waterproof bag and you snack on those on your walk back.

Speaker 2 (16m 1s): So let me follow up with the, the good review. Fantastic experience tubing at a lower gorge. A great way to immerse yourself in nature and beauty of the inner gorge while doing nothing but floating The ride was roughly 40 to 50 minutes depending on the current speed and water level. It was a bit rough and choppy at certain areas. But overall safe, if you keep an eye out when approaching rock or rapid areas, the walk from the rental office to the starting point of the gorge and the end of the gorge back to the, so basically the person is saying to walk from the end point back to where you started is about 20 minutes long.

Well carrying your tube, your helmet, your life vest and so on. So I think this is probably a good case of where maybe somebody didn't do their research or maybe somebody's expectations weren't great. And I think that's what I would say on this. So the other thing I would say in this particular area there is a lot of other river access. So if you want to kayak for example, I, I wouldn't kayak within the park. You might start within the park and you can go downstream and then there's more public access as you go downstream and, and you can re research that online.

You can actually go a long way. So the thing to remember too, this river goes all the way to Lake Erie. So if you wanna do some tubing or you wanna do some kayaking, this is a great home base and you can probably find a public access 0.5 minutes outside the park and then you can go do some of that as well. And so that also includes, you know, hiking, biking, all of those kind of things. So that would kind of be what I would suggest is if you do want a tube or you do want a kayak, you might actually wanna just bring your own stuff and go to a, a more lazy part of the river so to speak, to do that kind of activity.

But I think like there are so many reviews on here, there's a fifth wheel full of reviews about how beautiful it is, how much nature there is. You know, you can get relatively close to the gorge. It's great for taking pictures, great for hiking. This is not a wide open for the most part. This is not a wide open conservation area. This is kind of, I would almost describe parts of it like a traditional provincial park that you might be familiar with.

Speaker 1 (18m 9s): I would say though, when you're booking, so like we've said, when we were talking about some of the campsites being, you know, gorge adjacent, We did park there or camp there, sorry, with Fiona when before we had Isla. And so she would've been less than three years old. And I remember it being really stressful because we had a site that was adjacent to the gorge and it was just stressful having a toddler and making sure that like they stay away from the edge and all of that kind of stuff. So if you are looking at the campground map and you just see the river running through, like it is very clearly marked.

Like there's an outline in yellow or green that says like this is the gorge. So maybe choose the site if that is something that's going to stress you out and going to take a lot of your time to supervise really young children or pets just to choose another site within the park where you're still gonna get, you know, the same level of of the nature experience without being right on the edge of a cliff.

Speaker 2 (18m 60s): And they've started to put fencing in but like nothing's for sure. So Melina raises a good point and really what I think is, you know, this is a big park with, what did we say, over 450 sites. So there's a lot of selection of different styles of sites, right? From tents to full service hookups. So there's gonna be something that fits with your needs for your family. So let's maybe talk a little bit about the area because you know, summer in this area is like what, 10, 12 weeks long if we're lucky sometimes. And So we try to jam a lot into summer in those 10 or 12 weeks.

And so Fergus and Elora both have a ton of festivals. Yeah, that go on. If you go to the town site, there's over 10 festivals. There's something on every single weekend. And so I'm not gonna list all of them, but I'm maybe gonna hit the high ones. So there's the Meadows Music Fest, which is in the spring. The dates change, sometimes it's in late May, sometimes it's in early June. Canada Day is always a big one in both towns. You're gonna get into Medieval Fair, which is a festival downtown in Fergus. You're gonna get into the Highland Games in August, which is a really big festival at the Sports Plex.

Brings people from all over North America for Highland games, highland dancing, all kinds of stuff. So there's gonna be thousands of people in town that weekend. They also run every single weekend. There's multiple weddings going on at the Allora Mill. And then there is also River Fest. River Fest, which is another big concert

Speaker 1 (20m 29s): Multi-day.

Speaker 2 (20m 30s): It's a multi-day concert by the river fenced off. People go every single night. They hear lots of music and that brings in a lot of people. So

Speaker 1 (20m 40s): All of that to say camping reservations during the summer months, especially at the lower gorge conservation area, are very scanned.

Speaker 2 (20m 47s): Yeah. So you're definitely gonna wanna make a reservation if you're in the shoulder seasons you probably can get in. There's usually availability. There can be availability in the middle of the week. So don't think if you're listening to this in early 2025, don't think you've lost your opportunity to make a booking. I definitely encourage you to reach out. But you know, there's some big events that are coming to town. So make sure that you have a reservation if, especially if you're coming June, July, August, I think we talked a lot about what the opportunities are to do in the area.

It's just whether it's a day trip into Toronto where it's hanging around doing photography, biking, hiking, seeing the shops, going to the restaurants, all of those kind of things I think are great.

Speaker 1 (21m 30s): One of the really best things that you can do, even as a family, we've been doing this since the girls were really little, is to go to the racetrack and, which sounds a little, you know, adults and counterintuitive, but our kids have always loved it. They do a great barbecue and you can just go and you can have a look at the horses and watch a couple of races have a barbecue. The kids love watching the horses. Sometimes they have like mini din races where they'll put little dogs on the track and and let them run. And that's Wednesdays and Saturdays I think still is the schedule. But that happens, you know, from May to September, you know, not a two minute drive from the front gates of the, of the conservation area.

And it's a really, really fun, unique, neat little option to do for kids.

Speaker 2 (22m 14s): Yeah. And it's got, you know, there's a casino there, lots of parking food, it's, it's, they really do try to make it a family affair. Obviously you can't bring your kid into the casino, but they kind of set it up in such a way that you don't, the two aren't really overlapping and the girls always have a ton of fun every year that we do that. And you're gonna bump into somebody that you know. So that's really fun too. Molina's got a cup like attractions and amenities. She was gonna talk about, my piece of advice would be if you're planning to go out for dinner, maybe call ahead and make a reservation.

Yeah, a lot of these places will fill up quickly And I think you're gonna wanna make sure that you have a reservation, especially at some of the more formal sit down restaurants. It doesn't mean that you can't get somewhere to eat, but if there's that one restaurant you really wanna go to my advice or be on a certain patio, my advice is to phone ahead and make a reservation so that you're not disappointed because it is busy, especially in the summer months. I mean, even into the winter it can be really busy because they kind of have a, a whole thing going on all year long to promote the town,

Speaker 1 (23m 15s): Especially Monster Month. If you love spooky season, like me in the fall is a really fun time for you. You're gonna love Fergus/Elora in the fall because we're local to the area. I think it's only fair that we point out a couple of hidden and not so hidden gems places that we love that we frequent that if you're camping at the Gorge that you would probably love to. So out in Fergus there's some, you know, there's some great little restaurants and there's some unique little shops. But I would say if you're coming here for camping and you're, you're planning on making food at your campsite, there's two places that you should go to try for some really unique and local food.

One is Fraberts Fresh Foods, that's a great little grocery store in the Fergus marketplace. They have, you know, prepared dishes that you can pick up, which are fantastic. Chef Derek does a great job there and a lot of really local produce, good cheeses, you know, baked goods, something that you can get that's really tasty and you can take back to your campsite.

Speaker 2 (24m 11s): It's it's family owned. Derek and Jackie are amazing people. They employ locals, they employ local youth. This is not a chain kind of store. There is only one frat and it's popular with a lot of

Speaker 1 (24m 22s): Locals. Absolutely. And the second thing I would say to that as well is Joe's butcher shop downtown Fergus, if you wanna just get some really good cuts of meat that you can take back from barbecue at the site, that's a great place to go in Fergus. I would say while you're in that area, you can check out Temple Gardens, which is, it's actually a really neat place. And it's essentially, it's this, you know, set of limestone steps that go down to the river. People fish off the bottom of it. And at one point it was actually attached to, there's like the main street of Fergus, a lot of the houses that are now, or a lot of the stores used to be houses along the main street.

And this was a garden that this man who lived on that strip built for his wife back in the, I think it's the twenties. But anyway, it's a, it's an open park and it's open until dusk. They do close the gates at nighttime 'cause it does go down to the gorge. But that's a great place to check out. Nice little place for, for photos and just watching people, you know, fish kind of at the bottom of those stairs

Speaker 2 (25m 20s): And, and sometimes there's impromptu concerts in the, sometimes on Wednesday nights in the summer there is, they're impromptu, and this is one of the reasons I said, you really wanna check out the town website ahead of time to make sure you have the most current information. Other thing is, remember a little while ago I said this is a walkable town, Frabert's, Joe's Buscher shop in Temple's Gardens. They're all within a stone's throw, literally a stone's throw. You can throw a stone from one to the other. Not gonna like, don't do it, but you know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (25m 47s): Yeah. And then heading into Elora, I will say one of my favorite restaurants, we frequent there a lot, especially in the summertime. They have a very small patio, but it's called the Friendly Society. And you go down a set of stairs kind of into what used to be a pub and, and now it's the Friendly Society restaurant and the food is fantastic. When I tell you I crave this place, I crave this place and we, we go there a lot. And on that same note, all Allo is kind of like, it's like a story of like several ice cream shops.

There's a lot of ice cream in Elora because of how popular it is as a tourist destination. I think there's three ice cream shops. But I would say for us, the best place to get an ice cream in Allo is called Sugar Skulls. But it's on the other side of the river from where the downtown core is and the mill is. But it's literally, you know, a 32nd walk across the bridge and you're gonna find a great place. They do soft serve ice cream, they do like unlimited toppings. It is so good. They employ high school students primarily in the summer. So it's just that like quintessential ice cream shop vibe and it is so good.

Speaker 2 (26m 54s): It's right across from the LCBO. So for people that aren't from Ontario, the LCBO is where you go to buy your, your wine and liquor. It's right across the street from the LCBO also right across the street from a, a par a park and a splash pad and a spot to like let the kids burn off some energy again, all within walking distance, which I think is what makes it really nice. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (27m 14s): And listen, like we're not, we're not sponsored or paid by any of these places. We just love them and we love to freak with them. So we figure, you know, for first timers, these are all places that are 10 outta 10, you're gonna have a great experience. One thing I love to tell people, if they're on vacation, they wanna snap some really pretty family photos. Go to Victoria Park in Elora and there's a set of stairs there. You, it's not accessible, but you need to walk down a very steep set of stairs down into the gorge. And then you have this backdrop of the David Street Bridge, which is like a beautiful bridge with sort of arches and it's just, it's gorgeous and it is a very, very popular spot for locals to have their family photos taken.

So if you're looking for that beautiful little snapshot you can put on your Christmas card, that is the place to do it. And

Speaker 2 (27m 59s): I feel like once you get down to the bottom, you can kind of walk and amble your way up the river a little bit. Yep. And I think you might be lucky enough to catch somebody zip lining across, I mean, again, like everything, it's privately operated, so check ahead. But in years past, there's been a zip line across there as well, which is, might be for the Lowe a little bit more adventure. Did you wanna talk about the museum?

Speaker 1 (28m 22s): Yeah, I think the museum is a, a really great place to go. It's the Wellington County Museum and Archives. And it's located in a, Aboyne, which is just exactly halfway between Fergus and Elora. You actually can ride your bike to it from, from the gorge. From the park. There's a series of trails And I think, you know, part of 'em, you're gonna have to take some, you know, streets through all Elora and that will take you to the rail trail basically that will take you right to the museum. They have a ton of programs on all year long, especially in the summer months.

They have a ton of, of really great programs. It used to be what they would call a poor house, which is where it was kind of a farm. And people who didn't have a place to live were poor, were debtors. They would come and work the farm. So it's a little bit of a sad history, but beautiful building. They've done a really great job with hosting the archives and, and museum and understanding what life was like for rural Ontario. And if you actually visit the museum, if you walk down the hill from the museum and up a set of stairs on, there's sort of two rail trails that intersect.

There's like a beautiful bridge that you can go on that overlooks the river. And on the other side from that you're gonna see a grove of really tall pine trees. And that is actually a graveyard and it's a spot where all of these poppers were buried and there is no headstones. There's little markers that tell you kind of in groupings what year the people were put there from the 18 hundreds right up until the poor house closed. But it's a very like, reverent place. It's very quiet in this grove of trees. And you can visit and there's a, a cn sort of in the middle that has the names of, of all the people who are buried there.

So well worth a visit for sure.

Speaker 2 (30m 0s): Yeah. And you can, and Melina said, you know, you can go down that trail just a couple hundred meters and overlook the river and then you've got more access to walk down to the river. People will fish down there. So this is kind of the thing we're trying to reinforce in this podcast is everything is really intertwined with biking and trails and park at one spot and you can see three or four different things without having to keep moving your car around. The museum is really interactive. Displays are changing all the time. They usually have a car show once a year, so it's a really good spot to check out as well.

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (30m 33s): And there's another little park that they've built there to a playground pretty recently in the last couple of years. So you can kind of, you know, take the kids through the museum and when they've had enough of looking at exhibits, you can let them run around in the

Speaker 2 (30m 44s): Playground. And it like, if your kids have a bundle of energy, tell 'em to run to the bottom of the hill because they're gonna have to run back up the hill. They'll be tired, they'll sleep, and you can enjoy the rest of your afternoon. That's an old dad trick.

Speaker 1 (30m 55s): And on that dad track, I think we'll end it here.

Speaker 2 (30m 58s): Listen, I, I would encourage everybody to check out the area. There's a lot to do. This is a great spot. If you're coming for just a weekend or you're coming for a week, it's a great home base to drop some stuff, see some stuff really like within five, 10 minutes to your campsite, or make an hour and a half day trip and leave all your stuff behind so that you don't have to move everything around. And I, I think it's gonna let everybody connect with nature and just chill out a little

Speaker 1 (31m 24s): Bit. And if you're there in early May, you may see us there because that's where our shakeout trip is gonna be this year.

Speaker 2 (31m 30s): Well, and that's like the dad pro tip, right? Because there's full hookups, we can do our shakeout trip and we can de winterize all in the same spot. Right. And that's kind of cool not having to do it in the driveway

Speaker 1 (31m 41s): For sure. All right, we will talk to you again in a couple of weeks.

Speaker 2 (31m 46s): Oh, go ahead honey. No, no, I just wanted to thank everybody for listening. Follow us on social media, maybe come down, check us out at the, on Saturday at the open house at Niagara Trailers and have a great week

Speaker 1 (31m 58s): On Saturday, April 25th

Speaker 2 (31m 60s): On Saturday, April,

Speaker 1 (32m 3s): There's a couple. You gotta be specific Dan.

Speaker 2 (32m 6s): Sorry folks. Well safe travels to everybody and come on, check out the Elora Gorge conservation area.

Speaker 1 (32m 11s): I'll talk to you in a couple weeks.

Speaker 2 (32m 12s): Bye. Bye.