Mac Johnson Wildlife Area Has Two Entrances, And They Are Not The Same Walk

Most people who live in Elizabethtown-Kitley have been to Mac Johnson Wildlife Area at least once. Fewer of them have been to both halves of it. The property runs off two separate access points, on two different roads, and depending on which one you pull into, you get a different park. One side is picnic tables, a firepit, and the swans everyone comes to see. The other side is a boat launch, a quieter trailhead, and a loop that most casual visitors never find. If your mental map of Mac Johnson stops at the reservoir and the parking lot near it, you have seen half the story.

Debruge Road: the social side

The north entrance sits on Debruge Road, and locals still call the spot near it "Tin Cap." That's the address that shows up when the Friends of Mac Johnson Wildlife Area list a location for their winter and fall events. It's also where most of the property's built infrastructure lives: picnic tables, a large picnic shelter, firepit, and handicapped washrooms are available on the north side of the reservoir. This is the entrance you use if you're coming for the reservoir view, the reintroduced Trumpeter Swans, or one of the seasonal festivals the volunteer group runs throughout the year.

A short drive further up Debruge Road gets you to the Stefan Foerster Tree Nursery, where the Friends run their spring and fall tree sales directly from the property. It's a working nursery tied to the wildlife area's own restoration work, not a retail garden centre.

Centennial Road: the quiet side

Head to the other entrance and the character changes. There is a south entrance to the conservation area off of Centennial Rd, and it's the side that got a purpose-built canoe launch and dock system added around 2011, after Friends volunteers and Procter & Gamble employees spent several years installing roughly two kilometres of fencing along that same stretch of road to protect the wetland edge. If your goal is paddling the reservoir or walking without running into a festival crowd, this is the door to use.

Neither entrance is better. They're just different, and a lot of the confusion people have about "which trail is which" at Mac Johnson comes down to not realizing there are two separate starting points to begin with.

Five trails, eleven kilometres, and one thing that changed

However you get in, the trail network itself is consistent. The property offers over 11 km of trails across five unique routes: the Wildflower Loop, Railway Trail, Old Woods Trail, Boardwalk Trail, and Jack Pine Trail. The Wildflower Loop, also known as Trail 1, has the longest history as a formal, developed route. It was built as a wheelchair-accessible interpretive trail, with the final push completed by Procter & Gamble employee volunteers in September of 2000.

One thing worth knowing before you plan a winter walk here: the trails used to be part of a groomed cross-country ski network, and some longtime residents still expect that. The trails are open year-round, including for cross country skiing and snowshoeing, but are no longer groomed and maintained by Cataraqui Conservation on a regular basis. Bring your own gear and expect trail conditions, not a set track.

The swans, and the pond's other name

If you ask an older Elizabethtown-Kitley resident about Mac Johnson, some of them will still call it the Back Pond. The wildlife area was renamed by the Cataraqui Region Conservation Authority in 1987, to recognize the efforts and achievements of a Brockville resident and early Conservation Authority member, Mac Johnson. Before that, it was just the reservoir behind the fields, known by whatever the closest farm called it.

The swans came later, and they're not incidental wildlife. In 1999, the conservation authority and the Friends group became formal partners in a provincial reintroduction effort, initially building a naturalized enclosure for a single breeding pair. That was 27 years ago. The Trumpeter Swans you see gliding across the reservoir today descend from a program that started as a deliberate, funded restoration project, not a lucky visit from migrating birds.

The reservoir itself carries a Class 1 provincially significant wetland designation, the kind of classification that puts it in the same conversation as the region's most protected natural spaces, not just a scenic backdrop for a walk.

The volunteers who have run this for thirty years

None of the above happens by itself. The Friends of Mac Johnson Wildlife Area formed in 1996, which puts them at three decades of operation as of this year. Their work isn't ceremonial. Much of it happens during Wednesday morning work bees that run from April through October, covering trail maintenance, native plant nursery care, and event setup. Membership costs $25 a year for a family, and it funds the same tree nursery, docks, and fencing projects that shape which side of the property looks the way it does.

This is also a group that's still active in the current year, not a historical footnote. Their most recent seasonal event, the Winter Festival on the Debruge Road side, ran on February 16, 2026, drawing families out for the same mix of trail activities and volunteer-run canteen service the group has offered for years.

Dog sleds without snow

Here's the detail that surprises people who assume "dog sled" means January. Every fall, usually on a Saturday in the back half of October, the Friends run their Fall Festival on the Debruge Road side of the property, and the dog-sled teams show up anyway. The Mush LaRose crew races their dogs on wheeled scooter bikes and carts instead of runners, because there's no snow on the ground in October and nobody's waiting for there to be.

Past festivals have combined pumpkin carving, a scavenger hunt, hikes timed to fall colour, and a canteen running chili, sausages, and hot dogs, with campfire marshmallow roasting rounding out the afternoon. Admission has varied by year, sometimes ten dollars a vehicle, sometimes by donation, and the event has run as an all-weather day regardless of what the forecast says. Exact dates shift year to year, so the reliable move is checking the Friends' own event listings or Cataraqui Conservation's calendar as October approaches, rather than assuming last year's date holds.

If you're planning a visit this fall

• North entrance (Debruge Road, near Tin Cap): reservoir views, swans, picnic shelter, firepit, the tree nursery, and where seasonal festivals are staged.
• South entrance (Centennial Road): canoe launch, docks, and a quieter approach to the trail network.
• Trails are open year-round during daylight hours, dogs welcome on leash, but skiers and snowshoers should expect ungroomed conditions rather than a maintained track.
• The property spans roughly 532 hectares, about 1,300 acres, of wetland, field, and forest, all of it within Elizabethtown-Kitley's boundaries even though the address reads Brockville.
• Watch for date changes on the Fall Festival. It moves within October year to year, and the Friends confirm the exact Saturday closer to the event.

None of this requires a plan beyond picking a door and going. But if you've only ever used one entrance, the other half of Mac Johnson has been sitting there the whole time, on the other road, with its own trail, its own history, and its own reason to visit before the leaves are gone.

If you're the kind of Elizabethtown-Kitley resident who tracks details like this about your own township, you probably think about your own property the same way, curious what it's actually worth versus what you assumed. Gerard Fox keeps an eye on both sides of this market the same way he keeps an eye on both sides of this park. When you're ready to look, Get Your Instant Home Valuation and see where you stand.