Hike north of Barrie, Ontario at Anne Street and Carson Road

Background:

We often pass a trailhead at Anne Street North and Carson Road, just north of Barrie, and this weekend we decided to stop and see what the trails were like there. In mid October there was still a lot of yellow in the forest, and on a sunny Sunday there were lots of people out with their kids.

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Location and details of the hike:

Directions to the starting point of the hike:

From the south (Barrie):

  1. Take the Dunlop (Hwy 90) exit in Barrie and head east
  2. Go north on Anne Street, over the 400
  3. Continue on Anne Street, past the Barrie Union Cemetery and the Airport
  4. Anne Street ends at the start of the trail at Carson Road

From the north east:

  1. Head south on Bayfield Road North (Hwy 26)
  2. Pass through Snowvalley Road (Hwy 43)
  3. Go west on Carson Road (watch for the airport sign)
  4. Continue through the neighbourhood, up the hill
  5. Just as the speed limit increases to 80 km/hr you'll see Anne Stree on your left, and the start of the trail on your right

Hike details

I won't describe a specific hike, there are trails all through the area, so you can just walk north for a while, then east or west, then back south to the car... instead, I'll include the photos on this page as well. Like many trails, they are obviously snowmobile trails in the winter, and we saw/heard/smelled three ATVs speed by at one point along the main trail, along with a couple of mountain bikers.

The start of the trail has room for a few cars:
Room for a few cars.

We walked north through a thin line of trees, then to the left (west) around the farmers field in the following picture:
Farmers field to the left of the trail

In October 2009 the start of the trail had a LOT of garbage around. Not just a few dropped wrappers here and there, but garbage bags ripped open. People, unfortunately were ignoring the no-trash sign:
Starting north on the trail

Heading north the trail was quite rutted to start with, but before long the path got better, and there wasn't any trash to mention:
Trail improves as you continue north

We weren't looking for a very long hike, so we took the first side-trail left across the top of the field, through a wonderful forest that was quite yellow, in October:
Into the deeper forest

A side-trail

The side-trail ended towards the west end of the farmer's field, so we enjoyed the view, turned around and retraced our steps back to the car:
Looking up

I'm not sure exactly what is north of this trail, running up towards Snow Valley Road. I assume it connects to the Ganaraska Hiking Trail and the 9 Mile Portage Historic Route, but I'll have to go back again another time to figure that out! See this page for details on those and other hikes in the Barrie area.