Port Hawkesbury: Trails, Recreation and Culture

Port Hawkesbury offers a variety of ways to spend time outdoors or explore cultural interests. If you are planning a stay, you can choose from walking and cross-country skiing, play and sports areas, swimming, or exhibitions. This lets you shape your trip around the activities that interest you.

Trails through forests and along waterways

The Port Hawkesbury Trail System is a 10-kilometre network of trails that runs through stands of deciduous and coniferous forest and along streams and waterways. It offers opportunities for walkers, hikers and cross-country skiers year-round. The trail network accommodates both activities on foot and cross-country skiing.

Parking for the Port Hawkesbury Trail System is available at Grant’s Pond, on Crandall Road, at the Recreation Grounds and at the Tamarac Education Centre. These four locations can help you orient yourself as you explore the trail network and plan time for walking, hiking or cross-country skiing.

Park and swimming options

Port Hawkesbury Community Park is located on MacQuarrie Drive Extension. Its facilities include a playground, a splash pad, a bicycle pump track, and tennis and basketball courts. Washrooms and changing facilities are also available in the park.

Strait Area Pool offers recreational swimming in a 25-metre, six-lane pool and a wading pool. The park and the swimming pool have different focuses: Community Park features outdoor play and sports facilities, while Strait Area Pool is devoted to swimming.

Culture and a summer tradition

The Granville Green concert series has been a hallmark of summers in Port Hawkesbury for more than 30 years. The Port Hawkesbury Civic Centre is also home to the J. Franklin Wright Art Gallery, a cultural space for exhibiting works of art.

Port Hawkesbury’s Sports Wall of Fame permanently and publicly showcases the sporting achievements of athletes, teams and pioneers at the Civic Centre. The gallery focuses on works of art, while the Wall of Fame celebrates sporting accomplishments. Different subjects are therefore featured in the same cultural centre.

A dining option

Miller’s Tap and Grill is a dining option in Port Hawkesbury for fresh seafood and steaks. If food is also a factor in choosing your destination, this restaurant is a specific point of reference alongside the recreational and cultural offerings.

The wider destination of Inverness County

The wider destination of Inverness County offers additional landscapes and routes to explore at a regional level. The Cabot Trail runs along the west coast of Inverness County. The Celtic Shores Coastal Trail is a 92 km multi-use trail from Port Hastings to the community of Inverness, with more than 30 starting and access points. In comparison, the Port Hawkesbury Trail System is a 10-kilometre network of trails.

Black River Bog Nature Reserve is also located in Inverness County. It encompasses a rare alkaline fen and a delta wetland beside Lake Ainslie, and is home to at least 13 rare plant species. Inverness Beach, in the community of Inverness, is a 1.5 km sandy beach with a boardwalk above the beach. For regional travel, Highway 105, the Trans-Canada Highway, connects Inverness County and provides a direct route between the Canso Causeway and the Town of Sydney.

Discover more destinations: Craggie, Margaree Forks, Grand Étang, Petit Étang, Orangedale, Whycocomagh, Saint Joseph Du Moine, Inverness.

View the wider travel overview: Inverness County.