It has been several years since the last time I’ve visited Forest Lea. I remember lots of flies and a reasonable amount of trails to ride – albeit somewhat ‘rough’ due to lack of traffic (Pembroke being a small city & sparsely populated region would have minimal Mountain Bikers to pack the trails).
So during the last leg home during my recent work trip I decided to take the 5 min detour south off of Hwy 17 to see what’s new. It turns out there’s quite a bit more distance added, the Trailforks link doesn’t show as much as the trailhead map or their web site.
There’s approx. 31km now, consisting of 3 loops:
- Orange: Oliver and Q approx 6k
- Red Original loop: continuous singletrack of all nearer trails approx. 15k loop
- Blue back trails: an extra 10k added onto the Red loop – the more technical trails and longer climbs/descents
- Green is pretty much XC ski trails. I would target those only if I were riding a CX or gravel bike.
I rode the Orange loop and half of the red loop before having to bail to get home. Maybe had the trails been a little higher in the fun quotient I could have been convinced to finish all of it… read on.
Terrain is a mix of everything, hardwood forest with lots of roots & rocks, pine forest with smooth sandy content, Canadian Shield with exposed slick rock.
Not only was the terrain varied, but so was the actual feel of the trails. The hardwood sections tended to be tight and rooty and other sections such as the pine forest was a little quicker rolling with more open sight lines, and finally there were more wide open sections to let the bike roll.
While the variety was nice in a way, it was also difficult to really get into a rhythm as it varied quickly and sometimes without notice. It was almost like several builders each with different visions/skill were involved. Maintaining any kind of consistent speed was a chore.
Another aspect I didn’t like was their heavy use of the existing XC ski trails. Several times the single track dumped out onto these open & boring highways for several hundred meters, if not more. At least their XC trails were fairly dry and clear, and void of speed-sucking wood chips.
I understand leveraging XC trails if land is tight, but there appears to be enough available terrain at Forest Lea that they can skip that stuff and link up the singletracks. IMO the goal to a MTB centre should be to feel like you’re escaping civilization for a singletrack journey, not a constant reminder that this place is XC ski first, and MTB second.
The other disappointment is that there were quite a few sections where the trail was just poorly hacked together. Many of the bridges were an after thought, 2-3″ high tree stumps litter sections of trail begging for a pedal strike.
Even the older established trails had sections where a quick Pulaski could shave the old farming/till undulations to make the trail smoother and faster.
It’s almost like the builders were in a haste to add distance at the expense of quality, which is a shame because the potential is certainly there both in available terrain and willing builders. My suggestion is that going forward they clean & speed up the trail, and link up some of the singletracks to remove the recreational use of XC trails (keep them for races/passing). I’m hoping to come out sometime in the future to help with trail work.
Overall, this is still definitely worth a stop if you’re enroute between Ottawa & North Bay, just expect for things to be a little ‘unrefined’ and keep your head up for surprises.