Bruce MTB Adventure Park (Wiarton Ontario)
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Bruce Peninsula MTB Adventure Park near Wiarton, Ontario, is another of the Bike the Bruce trails. It also represents a crushing shame, because it is no longer the destination it once was.
Upon a time, the park was pull of professionally built black diamond trail features - skinnies, ramps, and other North Shore type structures, complete with "filter features" and other techniques to try and keep people from getting in too far over their heads. Sadly, the liability and insurance people got ahold of the place and all the fun stuff was ripped out. When we visited in the summer of 2010, all that was left were a few skinnies.
(There's more trail than pictured here; we didn't ride the whole thing)
The trails are well signed and junctions frequently have posted trail maps, so it is visitor friendly.
Happily, notwithstanding the efforts of the fun-governors, the trails retain an essential, natural character - they are largely carved out of rock. Even without the man-made features, the trails are very challenging and a lot of fun to ride. Over and over again we found sections to which our initial reaction was "we're supposed to ride that?" followed by surprise and elation when we actually cleared it. We learned more about our riding abilities (and the capabilities of our bikes) in one morning that we had in entire seasons of riding.
It's no Moab, and the loss of the Shore features really is something very sad. But the trails remain very technical and challenging and a day spent here is a lot of fun.
Located where it is in the middle of nowhere, it is tough to justify this as a vacation destination. If, however, you happen to be in the area of Meaford / Owen Sound, it is absolutely worth the trip down the road to visit this place.