Renfrew County covers roughly 7,600 square kilometres of eastern Ontario, making it the largest county in the province by land area. That number is worth sitting with for a moment. This single county is larger than all of Prince Edward Island, yet it has a population of around 100,000, most of it concentrated in a handful of small towns along the Ottawa River. The rest is forest — mixed hardwood and conifer on Shield uplands, cedar and tamarack in the lowlands, and white pine wherever the soil and the logging history allowed it to survive. Crown land accounts for a significant portion of the county's interior, and that crown land is the reason Renfrew County deserves a place on any wilderness traveller's map.
This is not glamorous wilderness. There are no towering mountains, no dramatic fjords, no glaciers. What Renfrew County offers is something more practical: accessible, affordable, and genuinely wild country within a few hours' drive of Ottawa and four hours from Toronto. You can leave work on Friday afternoon and be sitting beside a fire on crown land by nine o'clock that evening, listening to coyotes yip on the far ridge. That accessibility, combined with the county's enormous scale, makes it one of the most useful wilderness regions in the province for people who actually want to spend time in the bush rather than just talk about it.
The River Systems
Four major river systems drain Renfrew County, and together they offer enough variety to keep a paddler occupied for years.
The Ottawa River forms the county's northern boundary. It is the biggest water in the region — wide, powerful, and historically significant as the main transportation corridor for the logging industry that built the valley. The Ottawa has excellent sections for touring, particularly between Deep River and Petawawa, where the Shield shoreline offers granite camping spots and the river's islands provide sheltered paddling routes. See our Ottawa Valley page for detailed route information.
The Petawawa River is the county's most famous waterway, draining the eastern half of Algonquin Park before flowing through the town of Petawawa to the Ottawa. The river's combination of big-water rapids, remote forest, and historical significance — the log drives on the Petawawa were legendary — has made it one of Ontario's classic canoe trips. The lower sections flow through Department of National Defence land, but the upper river through Algonquin is the stretch that draws serious paddlers from across the country.
The Bonnechere River flows east through the heart of the county, from its headwaters near the Algonquin Park boundary to its mouth at Castleford. The Bonnechere is a gentler river than the Petawawa — mostly flatwater and mild rapids — but it flows through attractive country and offers good crown land camping in its upper reaches. The Bonnechere Caves near Eganville are a unique geological feature worth visiting: solution caves carved into 500-million-year-old Ordovician limestone that once lay beneath a shallow tropical sea. Standing in a cave full of marine fossils while surrounded by Shield forest above ground is a disorienting reminder of geological time.
The Madawaska River drains the county's southern portion, flowing from its headwaters near Algonquin down through Palmer Rapids and Barry's Bay to the Ottawa River at Arnprior. The Madawaska is the county's best whitewater destination, with reliable Class II-III water near Palmer Rapids and excellent flatwater touring on Bark Lake and Kamaniskeg Lake.
Crown Land
Crown land is the backbone of wilderness recreation in Renfrew County. Large tracts of publicly owned land are scattered throughout the county's interior, particularly between the major river valleys. Canadian residents with a valid outdoors card can camp on crown land for free for up to 21 days at a single site — a provision that makes Renfrew County one of the most affordable wilderness camping destinations in the province.
The Ontario Crown Land Use Policy Atlas is your essential planning tool. It maps the boundaries between crown land, private land, and other designations like conservation reserves and provincial parks. The boundaries are not marked on the ground, so checking the atlas before your trip is not optional — it is necessary. Print or download the relevant tiles for your area, because cell service is unreliable in exactly the areas where you need to verify land status.
Good crown land concentrations in Renfrew County include the uplands between the Bonnechere and Madawaska river systems, the area south and west of Petawawa between Highway 17 and Algonquin Park, and the Shield country around Centennial Lake west of Calabogie. Many of these areas are accessed by logging roads that range from decent gravel to rough two-tracks. A vehicle with ground clearance is advisable.
Towns as Staging Points
Renfrew County's towns are small, practical, and useful as staging points for wilderness trips. None of them are destinations in themselves — they are places to buy groceries, fill the gas tank, and get the last hot meal before heading into the bush.
Pembroke is the county seat and the largest town, with a population of around 14,000. It sits at the confluence of the Muskrat River and the Ottawa, and it has everything you need for trip provisioning: a Canadian Tire, grocery stores, gas stations, and a handful of outdoor shops. Pembroke is also home to a few outfitters who offer canoe rentals and shuttle services for the Ottawa and Petawawa rivers.
Petawawa is primarily known for its military base (CFB Petawawa), but the town is also a practical gateway to the wilderness. It sits where the Petawawa River meets the Ottawa, making it a natural staging point for trips on either river. The town has basic services and a growing retail strip along Highway 17. For local community resources including maps, conditions updates, and area information, check the town's website before your trip.
Barry's Bay is the gateway to the Madawaska Valley and the southern reaches of the county. It is smaller than Pembroke but has a surprisingly good grocery store, a gas station, and a hardware store where you can replace the tent pole sleeve you forgot or the stove fuel canister you used up on the last trip. Barry's Bay is also the jumping-off point for trips into the southern part of Algonquin Park via the Kingscote access.
Deep River, further up the Ottawa from Pembroke, is a quiet town built around the Chalk River nuclear laboratories. It sits on a beautiful stretch of the Ottawa River and offers access to crown land on both the Ontario and Quebec sides. Deep River has basic services but limited retail — plan to do your major provisioning in Pembroke.
Logging History
You cannot understand Renfrew County's landscape without understanding its logging history. From the early 1800s through the mid-twentieth century, the county's white pine forests were systematically logged to feed the British timber market and the growing cities of eastern Canada. The log drives on the Ottawa, Petawawa, Madawaska, and Bonnechere rivers were the economic engine of the region, and the towns along the Ottawa — Pembroke, Petawawa, Deep River — grew up around the timber trade.
The Opeongo Line, surveyed in the 1850s as a colonization road into the interior, was part of the government's effort to settle the land after the timber companies had taken the best trees. Families were offered free land along the road, but most found that the thin Shield soils could not sustain farming. The settlements that grew up along the Opeongo Line — communities like Brudenell, Killaloe, and Foymount — survived on a combination of subsistence farming and seasonal work in the remaining lumber camps. Many of the original homesteads were eventually abandoned, and the forest reclaimed them.
Today, forestry remains a presence in the county, but the scale is different. The old-growth white pine is largely gone — you can find remnants in Algonquin Park and in a few protected pockets — but the second-growth forest has matured into a productive and diverse woodland. Mixed stands of maple, birch, oak, and pine cover the uplands, with spruce and balsam fir at higher elevations and cedar in the wetlands. It is a healthy forest, and for a wilderness traveller it provides excellent habitat for wildlife and a beautiful backdrop for paddling, hiking, and camping.
Wildlife and Safety
Renfrew County supports healthy populations of black bear, moose, white-tailed deer, beaver, and the eastern wolf. Coyotes are common and occasionally vocal at night — their yipping and howling from a nearby ridge is one of the distinctive sounds of a night on crown land in the county.
Bears are present throughout the county and active from April through November. They are generally shy and avoid contact with humans, but they will investigate food smells. Proper food storage is essential when camping on crown land, where there are no bear-proof food lockers or hanging poles. Hang your food pack at least four metres high and two metres from the nearest trunk, or use a bear canister. Our bear awareness guide covers prevention, food storage, and what to do in an encounter.
Ticks have become increasingly common in Renfrew County over the past decade, including blacklegged ticks that can carry Lyme disease. Check yourself thoroughly after spending time in tall grass or brushy areas, and consider treating your clothing with permethrin before extended trips.
Planning Your Visit
Renfrew County is not a single destination — it is a region that contains many destinations. A first visit might focus on a specific river or a particular crown land area. Return trips can explore different drainages, different seasons, and different types of terrain. The county rewards familiarity: the more time you spend in it, the better you understand where the good campsites are, which logging roads are passable, and where the wildlife concentrates at different times of year.
From Ottawa, Pembroke is roughly ninety minutes on Highway 17. From Toronto, it is about four hours to Pembroke or 3.5 hours to Barry's Bay. The county is well-served by Highway 17 along the Ottawa River and Highway 62 running north-south through its interior. Beyond the main highways, expect gravel roads of varying quality and logging roads that require caution and sometimes a sense of humour.
The best times to visit depend on your interests. Paddlers will find the most water in May and June, the warmest conditions in July and August, and the best colours in September and October. Hikers will appreciate the bug-free days of September and October. Winter visitors — snowshoers, cross-country skiers, ice fishers — will find a county that is quiet, snow-covered, and almost entirely empty of other recreationists.
Whatever your entry point, Renfrew County delivers on the fundamental promise of Ontario wilderness: there is more of it than you can explore in a lifetime, it is closer than you think, and it costs nothing but the effort to get there.