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Winter Camping

Experience Ontario's great outdoors and learn how to plan cold-weather overnight outings with confidence and safety. This Winter Camping Experience teaches the special concerns of cold-weather camping and snowshoeing fundamentals.

This Experience is hosted by a professional wilderness survival and outdoor pursuits instructor and will cover such fundamentals as:

• how to select and setup winter camping gear
• clothing and footwear
• winter camping and sledding
• water and food requirements in sub-zero temperatures
• how to construct quinzees (snow huts) depends on snow conditions
• how to travel by means of snowshoe

Special consideration will be given to the problems faced in sub-zero temperatures, such as hypothermia, food storage, water procurement, travelling in deep snow.

Also included are four meals: lunch and dinner on the Saturday and breakfast and lunch on the Sunday.

Duration: 2 Days.

Winter Camping Experience Pricing

** Availability: February 11th and 12th (Algonquin Park) March 3rd and 4th (Moon River Basin)
$275.00 + HST per person	Gift Certificate Code: ADWC1

Experience Location

Things to Remember

A waiver of liability must be signed before participation.
Partial outfitting is available.
Participants are responsible for their food and transportation.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q. Where do we sleep?
A. If snow conditions are right, you'll build a quinzee, which is a kind of hut made out of snow. If conditions are not right for this you will sleep in tents.

Q. How long does the Experience last?
A. The group meets at the trail-head at 10am on the Saturday and returns between 3pm and 4pm on the Sunday.

Other Important Information

What is a Quinzee? A quinzee is similar to an igloo, although whereas an igloo is made out of blocks of snow a quinzee is made by hollowing out a mound of snow. In Southern Ontario conditions are rarely suitable for igloo building, but they are more frequently suitable for building a quinzee as all that is needed is a relatively flat area where there is an abundance of snow. A quinzee is constructed by piling snow to the desired height (typically 6 - 10 feet) and then allowing it to harden (2-4 hours, depending on the temperature). 10-12 inch sticks are then placed in the mound so that only the tops of the sticks remain visible. The excavation can then begin. When digging out the interior of the quinzee the idea is to dig in a slightly upwards direction form the entrance, so that the cold air will fall and not be held in the interior of the quinzee. Once you have reached the ends of the sticks form the inside of the quinzee, you will know that you have 10-12 inch think walls. Once completely excavated, light a candle inside the quinzee to glaze the walls. Whereas an igloo can often be used for seasonal use, a quinzee is usually only suitable for 1 or 2 nights of cover.

Meet our Survival Instructor...

David Arama has instructed Survival and Wilderness Training programs for Search & Rescue, the military, government ministry staffs and the private sector for 30 years. David is the survival instructor/consultant to the reality television industry, including the series "How to Survive" on HD Oasis, YTV's "Survive This", OLN's "Camp n' Out", and is 'Survivorman' Les Stroud's original instructor. David is also a frequent contributor to the national news media when reporting on survival and disaster stories.