Winter Trip to Fundy National Park

At the end of February we took a week off work and went on a winter adventure to Fundy National Park in southern New Brunswick. For three nights, we stayed in a ‘rustic cabin’ without running water and electricity. Amidst a network of trails, the cabin was the perfect place to disconnect. The weather was more spring-like than we would have liked, but thankfully, we got a perfect dose of winter the following weekend in the Wentworth Valley, Nova Scotia.

Read on to learn more, or head straight to the pictures.

Cabins

Fundy National Park has three rustic cabins. The cabins are simple — wooden beds, a table with chairs, a woodstove and an outhouse. Wood is provided, but that’s about it, so you should bring all your camping gear minus the tent.

We stayed at the McKinley cabin (R03), which was located about 2 km from the parking lot for the Chignecto Recreation Area (see map). We used our hiking backpacks and a sled to transport our gear and 15+ L of water. We wore our snowshoes on the hard packed snow and it took us about an hour to make the trek.

During our trip, we visited the other two cabins while out snowshoeing the trails. The Maple Grove and Hastings cabins are a few years older than the McKinley cabin, where we stayed. But, their outhouses were definitely more modern with solar panels powering a fan! All three cabins face south and have nice views of the Bay of Fundy, but the Hastings cabin has the largest windows so likely lets in the most light.

Trails

The cabins are all located within the Chignecto Recreation Area, which is a network of trails for snowshoeing, cross-country skiing and fat biking. The trails are groomed daily and have great signage. The parking lot is located next to the Pavilion, which offers a heated eating area, running water, washrooms and — best of all — showers!

We brought both snowshoes and cross-country skis with us, but the hard-packed, slippery conditions meant that the skis stayed in the car this time. One day, we went for a 10+km snowshoe directly from our cabin, covering the blue, green, red and yellow trails. The next day — after 30mm of rain and many hours of reading our booked by the fire — we ventured out for a short misty walk.

Weather

As a Maritimer, Justine is well-aware of the unpredictability of winter in this region. When we booked the trip she said “Let’s do three nights, because chances are the weather will be bad one day”. Sure enough, we had rain and wind warnings on our second night and the temperature reached 8 degrees Celcius during the day. Then, it dropped to minus 8 degrees Celcius overnight, so everything was very icy when we left! So, it was truly a winter vacation in the Maritimes, but next time we will be hoping for a little more snow!

Weekend Adventures near Wentworth

Our adventure actually didn’t end at Fundy National Park. After a much needed shower at the Pavilion, we stocked up on groceries and drove to the Wentworth Valley in Nova Scotia where we spent the weekend at a private cabin with some friends and their kids. Justine has been coming to this cabin since she was a baby, and it has become a special place to both her and her friends. It is 500 m from the nearest plowed road, it has electricity, but does not have running water, so it is ‘rustic-ish’. We are forever grateful to be able to use this cabin and for Justine’s dad and his friends who maintain it all year round.

And, we finally got the perfect winter adventure we were craving. We had 20 cm of fresh snow on Friday and a beautiful bluebird day on Saturday. We went snowshoeing, sledding, cross-country skiing, and we roasted marshmallows and played games. It was glorious.

Pictures

With limited electricity and phones that die in the cold, we took fewer pictures than normal on this adventure. But, we still captured the beauty (and variability) of winter in the Maritimes.