Kelso Conservation Area

Went: Sunday, September 6, 5 p.m.
This review is only for the beach.
I have not been to many beaches, maybe 4 times in my life, including this one. My date has been to many more. The water was quite muddy and very brown and was not something either of us wanted to swim in.

~ A 3.5 stars ~
I went their for a picnic with the family… Over all its a clean place and is good for BBQs. The place we were at there didn’t seem to be any BBQs you will have to bring a portable one. Then we went for a stroll and seem like there is a mini beach area as well.
You can rent kayaks and enjoy the lake.
Overall good place for some quiet picnic… nothing much.

I am giving the four for the park overall, however the beach is not so good. We come here for triathlon training and the water is pretty murky, lots of seaweed, and as of today, goose poop everywhere. I don’t mind paying an entrance fee as I appreciate us keeping up our beautiful conservation areas. But the water is pretty gross, it’s too bad humans have to ruin nature. Any ways the hiking trains are gorgeous. And if you want to Tri train there is a long road you can run or bike down after.

— Close proximity to Toronto
— Trails are not too long but all clearly marked.
— Bruce trail go through here, with short side trails. Escarpment trails offer a good view of Kelso Lake and 401
— It has quite a bit of short trials for biking
— Glen Eden has a bit of everything. It offers picnic area, beach area, swimming, boardwalk by the lake, boat rental, hiking, biking… Looks like a great place for family outing with BBQ lunch then swimming or sit by the beach, while teens could do stand up paddle or hike the trails.

Lots of great things to do year round. The beach is nice, and not super crowded during the week or in the evening. It is busy during weekend day times.
Skiing is great in winter, hiking is incredible in fall and spring.
Well worth the 6.75 price of admission.

I had no idea this place even existed until recently. Our tri group is using the lake for open water swim practice.
The beach is quite popular — especially on a hot day like today. It was a pain to get in as the entrance was really backed up. Note: it’s $ 6.75 per person to enter the area. But I guess most places have fees now.
The water has buoy lines to separate deeper areas from the shallow. Once past the shallow line the water is quite random and you can touch the ground in one spot and not right beside it. Lots of seaweed and the water is pretty murky. That being said, it is a lake.
There’s areas for picnics and saw lots of people bringing portable bbqs to cook on.
We just went to swim, but it’s a nice, close beach and I can definitely see the attraction.
I don’t know if I’d go back just for the beach, but it’s great for open water swims for sure!

We went to the picnic areas with some family. It was okay. A little weird that we had to drive down a really steep hill (I can definitely see someone rolling over that hill in their car)
Other than that, it was okay. We couldnt really find the beach, but we didnt look hard enough.
Suggestion: It would be great if they had like an ice-​cream store where the picnic areas are.

As an outdoor enthusiast, I have to base my 4-​star rating of Kelso mostly due to the proximity of the park to Oakville. This truly is a four seasons recreation area just minutes away from my home. In the winter, you can shred at Glen Eden. The hill is very small, but offers a nice terrain park on days you want to practice your tricks. One complaint of the GE is that it’s filled with a lot of skiers and snowboarders who don’t know what they’re doing, but I guess you get a lot of that no matter where you go. It definitely is a good place to go if you’re a first-​timer. However, I do spend most if not all of my time in the terrain park.
When it gets warmer, you can hike and mountain bike on the escarpment. The mountain bike trails offer a little something for everyone. If you go on the weekdays, it usually is not busy unless you go there during a race night. There is even a small lake to kayak or canoe, and on those hot summer days, a beach is located on the western edge of the lake to relax and swim. The beach does get really crowded on summer weekends so I would recommend swimming on the weekdays. As well, this is not a beach where you will find beautiful, bronzed beach bodies. Swimming in jeans and polo shirts is more of the norm here.
All in all, Kelso is not a bad place to frequent if you live close to the park. It’s an inexpensive place to get your outdoor fix in. I primarily use the park for snowboarding and mountain biking, but there are other fun uses too!

This place is amazing! In Summer or Winter! In the Summer you can take a cold refreshing dip in Kelso Lake which is really clean, kids can play on it’s sandy beach and build sandcastles, they have a snack bar lifeguards throughout most of the day. They have tons of Summer Camps always going on here, so part of the Beach is always reserved for the Summer Camp as well as other parts of the Conservation Area.
Then they have the awesome MTB trail atop the escarpment which has 16 km of tracks, which are rated anywhere from beginner to advanced. As you can see by the pictures that I have uploaded with this review. You can spend a full day alone there. But a Helmet is a must, without it they won’t let you on the track… so don’t forget…
Well and then in the Winter they have the downhill skiing and snowboarding, 12 different runs and 5 lifts. They also have rentals and lessons.
So for next year I am buying the season pass guaranteed!!!
The only bad thing to say about the conservation area is the camping experience, we have small kids so we wanted our first camping trip to be close to home in case we need to retreat. So we decided to camp here, the sites are huge and very nicely taken care of. Biggest downfall was the constant soundtrack of the 401, to the point that I got woken up several times during the night. Not to mention the freight cars that started moving also in and out early in the morning. So camping is a no here. But there are plenty of huge picnic areas which are beautiful and I could recommend.