Mikisew Provincial Park is a small campground and day use area in South River - with 4 beaches on Eagle Lake! Here's what you need to know!
It’s a campground that’s come up a fair amount in the camping Facebook groups we’re in, with generally positive posts about it.
Located on the shore of Eagle Lake - in the Parry Sound District - it’s not only a short drive from Arrowhead Provincial park (45 minutes), it’s also less than an hour from North Bay, and slightly over an hour from Algonquin park.
It’s the perfect destination for those who enjoy lake swimming - there are 3 shallow sandy beaches, PLUS another that’s specifically a dog beach!
It’s also a great place for canoeing and kayaking, with a bunch of small islands to paddle around on Eagle Lake.
We had a great time checking out all the recreational options at Mikisew - they have a really cool Disc Golf setup, and more!
Anyway, let us tell you all about it...
The Basics:
Campground Name: Mikisew Provincial Park
Address: 301 Park Road South South River, ON P0A 1X0
Website: Mikisew Provincial Park
Price: Ontario Provincial Parks uses a pricing matrix across all their parks. See 2024 Camping Fees for more details.
Reservations: Ontario Parks Reservations
Park Classification: Recreational
Season: May 17, 2024 to October 15, 2024
Logistics
We booked our stay at the last minute, as a bit of a side trip while staying at Arrowhead Provincial Park. There were plenty of sites available.
The park is pretty much equidistant between Arrowhead and Restoule Provincial Park, probably 15 minutes off the highway in the town of South River.
The road to get from the highway to the park isn’t great, but it’s definitely passable for any kind of rig.
Anyway, here’s some more information to help you plan your stay:
Registration and Check In
We had originally planned to book a day use pass to check out the park, and we were shocked to see that wasn’t even an option online.
I called the reservation line, thinking maybe there was just a glitch. Nope - she said day passes weren’t available for that park.
So, we booked an overnight stay, as we’d really been interested in checking it out.
Upon arrival at the park office, we were told that they DO offer day-use passes, you just have to get them in person. Bizarre!
It’s a really small park, and it’s a bit of a drive from anywhere. I can’t imagine having to just go there and hope it’s not sold out!
Check in was also fast and friendly - as usual.
It took place inside the small gate house, there was no window service or kiosk available at Mikisew Provincial Park.
Maps and Signage
For such a small park, there was a shocking amount of map involved!
The main map was the tabloid newspaper type thing that we tend to see at the larger parks. As with Driftwood Provincial Park - the first and only time we’ve seen it - the park shares its newspaper with another park. In this case, Restoule.
We were also given a 2 sided, 8.5 x 11" black and white map, and there was a trail guide available as well...
Park Map
The park maps inside the newspaper are big, clear, and in full colour.
One side was the “activity guide” - basically a park overview, with the larger trails and disc golf course included.
The other side was a campground map, with the smaller trails, washrooms, and campsite numbers included.
This map was a nice quick reference, but not great when it comes to the campsites: The key denotes electrical, non electrical, and barrier-free sites.
The problem is, when printed in black and white... the font looks exactly the same for each!
One thing to note: the scale on the map is a bit odd. Especially when it comes to the various beaches - everything is a lot closer to each other, than the map makes it seem.
Also, the whole section with the dog beach, point trail, and the small beach on the other side of the point trail is all open.
You can access the dog beach and everything else from that small beach, despite the map making it look like it was just one trail out. It’s all open space back there!
Finally, several things - like the volleyball court and basketball court - aren’t on either map.
Signage
Bit of a mixed bag on the signage. The main campground signage is great. Most (all?) of the directional signs are big, high-contrast blue and white signs - easy to see.
The campsite numbers are much smaller, and lower contrast - a bit more difficult to see.
That said, it’s a pretty small park. If you have a map, you should have no trouble getting around.
(Really, you can get around most of the day use stuff without a map - the campground is a bit more confusing of a layout, though!).
Also, there are BIG, clear map signs at the main trail heads - love it!
Waste Services
The trailer sanitation station is conveniently located near the park office.
It’s definitely better located for those leaving the park, but it’s easy to access upon arrival, as well.
On the little road leading up to the poop loop, you’ll first come to the garbage disposal and recycling area. This was a bit different than most we’ve seen, as it was a trailer set up.
There was a ground-level receptacle for liquor containers, but everything else involved going up a few steps.
There is a single dump platform on the left, followed by a single fill platform on the right, then another single fill platform on the left.
The hoses on the fill platforms are not threaded.
Connectivity
We had decent to really good internet every time we checked our phones. I was shocked at how good the reception was even way out on the furthest trail!
Accessibility
Both of the comfort stations offer barrier-free washrooms, and there are apparently 4 barrier-free campsites (per the website)... but only 3 are shown on the map.
The garbage and recycling area isn’t very accessible, as previously noted. We didn’t see any ground-level alternatives to hauling garbage up the stairs.
That said, the park does seem to make a bit of an effort on the accessibility front.
Right in front of the park office, there’s an all-terrain beach wheelchair on display, which can be borrowed. (I believe a deposit is involved).
Weirdly, the site doesn’t mention anything beyond the washrooms and campsites.
Anyway, the two main trails were not in any way accessible - I wouldn’t even do them in a walking boot, and I’ve done some pretty wild things when booted!
The shorter trails are easier and definitely do-able for those with mobility aids in general, but probably aren’t actually wheelchair accessible.
Pets
Mikisew Provincial Park has a really nice set up when it comes to their pet exercise area.
There’s a fenced in leash free dog park to let your dog run wild in, and it opens out onto a really nice dog beach.
The beach is sandy with shallow water, and there are even some picnic tables there. Really cute, well-thought out area!
Outside of that dog park, the basic provincial park rules apply - keep your dogs leashed, pick up after them, don’t let them bark excessively, and don’t let them harass other dogs, people, or wildlife.
Parking
There wasn’t a TON of parking available, but it seemed adequate for the size of the park. There was decent parking available at most “attraction” type areas.
In general - if you’re able bodied - this was a very walkable park. Between that and the weird day-use parking situation, it probably doesn’t need much in the way of parking lot size.
Miscellaneous
For early risers, the beaches are all almost directly east-facing, so I’d imagine there are some great sunrises at Mikisew park.
The park is also in an area of very low light pollution. While it’s not a great location for viewing the northern lights, it should be fantastic for night sky viewing - once you get out from under the campground tree cover, anyway.
Best to hit the beach for any sky watching there!
Campground Amenities & Info
We only overnighted at the park - and didn’t use all of the amenities - but here’s some basic information about what’s available:
Creature Comforts
There are two main comfort stations - with flush toilets, laundry facilities, and showers - in the campground, one in each of the main campground areas.
Both are designated as offering barrier-free access, we did not end up using the comfort stations, though.
That particular set of vault toilets seemed new-ish, and were in great condition. The others were all the older, creepier style of outhouse.
Park Store
There’s a small park store inside the park office / gate house, offering a small selection of camping supplies.
The park map - and website - direct visitors to the Eagle Lake Narrows Country Store, which is up a 1.8 km walking/biking trail from the park. (Accessed from the north side of the campground).
Visitor Centre
There is no visitor center at Mikisew Provincial Park.
Day Use Area
The day-use area is spread across 3 small regular beaches, as well as a small dog beach.
They’re almost completely interconnected via the Lakeview Trail and Point Trail, with the last beach easily accessible via a campground road.
The beach volleyball and basketball courts aren’t listed on the map, but they’re both located near the dog beach area. The beach volleyball court is next to the dog park, and the basketball set up is in the parking lot next to it.
All three beaches are were clean and in good condition, with hard-packed sand and shallow, bouyed swimming areas.
Rentals
Rentals are handled out of both the park office, and the nearby Eagle Lake store.
Stand up paddleboards, bikes, and sports equipment (Basketballs, fishing rods, Frisbees, horseshoes, PFDs, soccer balls, volleyballs) are rented out of the park office, and loans are available for all-terrain beach wheelchairs. (Deposits required).
Canoe and kayak rentals are handled out of the nearby Eagle Lake Narrows Store.
Campsite Details
The campsites in Mikisew Provincial Park are a mix of electrical and non electrical sites, spread across two campground areas: Hardwoods Campground and Pines Campground.
As always, each site comes with a picnic table and a fire pit.
Beyond that...
The Hardwoods Campground is made up of mostly electrical sites, located in a mature Maple and Oak forest, and has easy access to the beach and day use areas. Some excellent spots for tent camping families, IMHO.
The Pines Campground is mostly vaulted uphill a bit from the Hardwoods Campground, in a Red Pine forest.
These sites are less private - but more level - and definitely better suited to RVs.
We love the vibe in this section of the campground, with the towering pines and open feel.
Group Camping
There are two group campsites in Mikisew Provincial Park. One is pretty basic, the other is probably the nicest we’ve seen in any park.
The basic one is called “Woodlot”, and it’s for 7-25 people, tents only and no electricity.
It’s your basic campsite - a few parking spots, the actual campsite surrounded by trees.
The other - Bonfire - is a waterfront group campsite ... with its own private beach!
That one is intended for 15-50 people, and allows up to 4 trailers, along with tents. No electricity, but this one has a privy at the site.
Middle and Bottom: Bonfire Group Campsite
Seasonal Campsite Program
In addition to the nightly campsite rentals, there’s also a seasonal campsite leasing program.
It’s available for both non-electrical and electrical campsites, and there are seasonal sites in both Hardwoods and Pines Campgrounds.
For more information on seasonal camping - we’ve never done it! - see the Ontario Park’s seasonal rentals page, at https://www.ontarioparks.ca/seasonal.
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Entertainment and Activity
For such a small park, there’s a shocking amount of activities you can enjoy! Here are the details on everything you can choose from:
Hiking
When it comes to hiking in Mikisew Provincial Park, there are two categories of trail.
The first is the actual “Capital H” hiking trails - a set of 3 moderately difficult walks that take you through changing forest and wetland areas.
There are the Beaver Meadow and Maple Canyon Trails (connected loops), as well as the Old Dog Trail, which connects them to the day use area.
The other type of trail is a set of 2 short trail options that go from one section of the day use area to another, and are more like... walking paths. Short, not challenging... good for a stroll.
Anyway, here’s some specifics about each trail:
Beaver Meadow Trail - 2km (Red Trail)
The main trailhead of the Beaver Meadow trail can be accessed from the front gate area of Mikisew.
There’s parking near the front office, then you walk back to the entry to the park and cross the road to get to the trailhead.
We didn’t access the trail that way, though - we came in via the Old Dog Trail.
Either way, this trail started off a bit weird, crossing over sections of the Disc Gold course. It was a bit confusing, and it would have felt awkward if people had been playing at the time.
This section of the trail was really wide, flat, and well maintained with a bed of mulch to walk on.
Once past the disc golf area, the trail goes over a cute little boardwalk, and turns into a more traditional hiking trail.
Up til this point, the trail is somewhere between easy and moderate. After the wetland, it takes you into upland forest... and the trail becomes moderate to difficult, with some pretty wild inclines.
There’s a spot around ⅔ of the way in where the trees pretty quickly go from older trees, to much younger. We wondered if there had been a fire there - it was an interesting change in scenery.
Anyway, there are a couple more boardwalks and a little lookout over the marsh, before connecting up with the Blue (Maple Canyon) trail.
At that point, we turned right to continue onto the blue trail, for one big hiking loop.
Maple Canyon Trail - 2.3km (Blue Trail)
This trail was very similar to the last one - about the same length, the same difficulty level, and a lot of the same scenery.
Well, minus the water views, anyway!
Maybe it’s just that it was getting really hot and I was having issues with my feet, but by the time we turned onto the blue trail, I was kind of over it.
This trail felt like a lot of work, for ... not so much in the way of scenic payout.
Old Dog Trail - 800m (Yellow Trail)
This one is a short hike that connects the parking in the day use area (near the boat launch) to the intersection of the Beaver Meadow and Maple Canyon Trails.
We started out from the boat launch parking area, where the trail started out narrow. It quickly took us over a little foot bridge, past a little marsh area.
A pleasant enough walk to get to the trails we were looking to do, but not really a “destination” trail on its own.
Lakeview Trail - 300m (Green Trail)
This trail seemed like it was intended to be along the lines of a campground walking trail - a path to get between two places - but it was a bit more rough than you’d expect for such a path.
It’s not wheelchair accessible, and a stroller might have a rough go of it, but generally an easy enough walk for the abled.
Mostly just some roots and such to make for a less-level trail. Nice enough walk, has some nice water views.
The Point Trail - 300m (Orange Trail)
This is a really short walk that take you out onto a little peninsula, for a panoramic view of the lake.
Flat, well packed ground, probably wheelchair accessible - I forgot to make note of that for sure, though.
There’s a picnic table at the point, a cute little lookout spot. (There were people there at the time, so we didn’t get a photo).
Biking
There aren’t any dedicated bike trails at Mikisew, but cycling is allowed on the campground roads.
It’s a really small park, so if you have a bike, you can get pretty much everywhere.
No bike? No problem - the campground office rents them out!
Swimming
There are 3 main beaches in Mikisew Provincial park: North Beach and Centre Beaches are in the Hardwoods Campground, and the third beach - Day use beach - is a short walk down a trail from there.
Each of these main beaches are sandy - really firmly packed sand - and have a swimming area marked off with buoys.
Aside from those, there’s also a dog beach, AND one of the group campsites have direct access to their own private beach.
The sand seemed really clean at each of the beaches during our stay .
Birding, Wildlife, and Nature
This was one of those sad occasions where we saw some fantastic birds - including one we’ve been wanting to see for AGES now - and the conditions just weren’t any good for actually getting photos of them!
The bulk of birds we saw were along the hiking trail loops, which is where we saw our first Black-Throated Blue Warbler! (We’ve got a thing for birds that have any amount of blue on them.)
The lighting... wasn’t great. Bah!
Anyway, over the course of our stay we heard: American Redstart, Brown Creeper, Common Loon, Hairy Woodpecker, Red-Eyed Vireo, Rose-Breasted Grosbeak,
... and we saw: American Robin, Black-and-White Warbler, Black-Capped Chickadee, Black-Throated Blue Warbler, Blue Jay, Common Grackle, Downy Woodpecker, Red-Breasted Nuthatch, White-Breasted Nuthatch.
... we did not see or hear any of the Bald Eagles or Ospreys mentioned on the park website. 🙁
Honestly, before we took up hiking, I had no idea that there were SO many wildly different fungus varieties.
Sure, I knew there WERE a ton of different species, I just sort of assumed they were mostly mostly of the “brown, vaguely mushroom shaped” variety.
So many different colours and shapes - we’re really enjoying seeing how many different types we spot on any given trail.
Boating
There’s a small boat launch in the day use area, and there were smaller watercraft - canoes, kayaks, and stand-up paddleboards launching from pretty much every beach in the park.
The lake was really calm, and there were SO many people out on it that day.
As a note: There are numerous unmarked shoals on Eagle Lake, so be careful!
Fishing
We didn’t see many people fishing during our trip to Mikisew Provincial Park, but apparently Eagle Lake is a popular fishing spot in general.
Lake Whitefish, Large Mouth Bass, Northern Pike, Perch, Small Mouth Bass, and Walleye are the species available.
Disc Golf
Disc Golf seems to be a popular activity at Mikisew Provincial park - it’s only the second Provincial Park we’ve seen that offers this option - Bronte Creek Provincial Park being the first!
The course at Mikisew differs from the one at Bronte Creek in a few ways:
1. While Bronte Creek was all out in the open, the course at Mikisew is all in the woods. Honestly, it looked a bit intimidating. I’m sure I would end up hitting every last tree in the area!
2. Mikisew actually has two courses - their original, 9 hole course, and a full, 18 hole course. These are separate courses, btw, not “the first 9 holes of our 18 hole course are its own course”
3. Bronte Creek had a super cute setup at the entry to that area, with a disc lending library, educational signage for beginners, and all. The course at Mikisew didn’t feel quite so welcoming - you could rent or buy discs at the campground office, though.
Discovery Program
As with most (all?) of the Ontario Provincial Parks, Mikisew PP runs a Discovery Program during July and August.
Mikisew’s program seems to be mostly centered around Exploration Stations, and mostly on weekends (just going on the event listing during our visit!).
Niantic Games
There are quite a few Pokestops / Gyms / Ingress Portals located throughout the park, and generally decent cell phone coverage to be able to use them, should you choose to play.
More importantly, the Pokemon Go map came in pretty handy when it came to using the hiking trails!
Final Thoughts
We enjoyed this park - it’s really cute, and the beaches are actually really nice.
As a destination, though... being less than an hour away from Arrowhead Provincial Park is going to make this one a tough sell, for us.
Arrowhead is among our favourite campgrounds, after all!
The trails at Mikisew fall into two categories: The big long ones that were OK enough, but not really something we’d bother doing a second time. Not a lot of scenic payoff for the effort, you know?
Then there’s the other ones that are two short to really even see as a trail. Nice enough little walk, but not really enough to count as a hike.
I feel very “Goldilocks” at the moment.
I could definitely see there being people that prefer Mikisew to Arrowhead - and this would be an amazing park for people with young families, dogs, etc.
We were actually surprised at how busy the park was, for something that small, and with a fair number of the sites empty (we went on a Wednesday). The people who were staying there definitely seemed to be enjoying themselves to the fullest! The beaches were actually really busy even by noon.
For us, though... it’s a bit further than a park we already love, and a bit of a hassle to get to.
A cute park, really nice for what it is, just not so much our bag, you know?
More Provincial Park Campground Reviews
Want to read some more of what we have to say about the campgrounds we've stayed at? Here are some more reviews!
Arrowhead Provincial Park
Awenda Provincial Park
Balsam Lake Provincial Park
Bass Lake Provincial Park
Bon Echo Provincial Park
Bonnechere Provincial Park
Bronte Creek Provincial Park
Canisbay Lake, Algonquin Provincial Park
Chutes Provincial Park
Darlington Provincial Park
Driftwood Provincial Park
Earl Rowe Provincial Park
Emily Provincial Park
Ferris Provincial Park
Inverhuron Provincial Park
Killbear Provincial Park
Lake Superior Provincial Park
Long Point Provincial Park
MacGregor Point Provincial Park
MacLeod Provincial Park
Mara Provincial Park
McRae Point Provincial Park
Neys Provincial Park
Pinery Provincial Park
Point Farms Provincial Park
Port Burwell Provincial Park
Quetico Provincial Park
Rideau River Provincial Park
Rock Point Provincial Park
Rondeau Provincial Park
Sauble Falls Provincial Park
Selkirk Provincial Park
Sibbald Point Provincial Park
Sleeping Giant Provincial Park
Turkey Point Provincial Park
Wheatley Provincial Park
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