A Muskoka Maple Adventure: Tapping Into Tradition at Windermere House
Celebrate the flavours and stories of spring with a weekend getaway to Muskoka – a truly unique escape into the heart of Ontario’s maple season. Stay two nights at the historic Windermere House on Lake Rosseau, explore maple season from forest to table, learn Indigenous maple traditions, visit a six-generation family sugar bush, and enjoy maple-inspired dining. This immersive weekend celebrates the arrival of spring through meaningful cultural connection, local food traditions and moments to slowing down and savour Muskoka at its sweetest. We look forward to welcoming you.
Tapping Into Tradition A Muskoka Maple Adventure at Windermere House
March 20 – 22, 2026
- Two-night lakeview stay at Windermere House
- Fireside Elder welcome with Wahta Mohawk Elders Lucia and Terry Sahanatien
- Welcome canapés and warming beverage
- Daily breakfast
- Round-trip transportation to Brooklands Farm
- Guided sugar bush and sugar shack experience
- Maple-inspired farm brunch at Brooklands Farm’s 1876 log home
- Three-course maple-themed dinner with live music
- Full access to barrel saunas, outdoor hot tub and fitness centre
- Guided reflection session with Pamela Hubbard
- $50 gas card (received at check-in)
Price:
- 1 Adult: $892.00 CAD (including taxes & fees)
- 2 Adults: $1,100.00 CAD (including taxes & fees)s)
Tapping Into Tradition A Muskoka Maple Adventure at Windermere House
The first warm day after a freezing night. That’s when it happens. Across Muskoka, maple trees begin their quiet alchemy, drawing water from thawing roots and transforming it into the sweet sap announcing spring’s arrival. This is maple season, and it’s more than a harvest—it’s a homecoming.
Our Tapping into Tradition package invites you into this moment of transition, connecting you to the land, the people, and the traditions that make Muskoka’s maple season unforgettable.
Your Home Base: Windermere House
Your journey begins at Windermere House, a heritage resort that has welcomed travellers since the 19th century. Perched on the shores of Lake Rosseau, this isn’t just accommodation, it’s a place where the community gathers, stories are shared, and the seasons are celebrated. Here, you’ll experience elevated maple-inspired dining that brings the journey from forest to farm to table. The culinary team crafts menus that honour the season, showcasing maple traditional and unexpected ways.
Between adventures, the property offers everything you need to rest and recharge: plunge pool, hot tub, three-barrel saunas overlooking the lake, steam rooms, and outdoor fire pits for evening gatherings.
Honouring the Land
For Indigenous communities, maple season has long marked a time of ceremony and gratitude, honouring the Creator for the first harvest of the year and the nourishing gift of the maple tree.
Through guided cultural experiences, you’ll be invited to understand deeper stories of this land and the traditions that have sustained communities here for generations. This isn’t observation, it’s an invitation to listen, learn, and carry these teachings forward with respect. Wahta Mohawk Elders Lucia and Terry Sahanatien will guide you with stories, patience, and a way of seeing the land that nourishes us all. Terry belongs to the Bear Clan family and Lucia is part of the Turtle Clan family. They live in Wahta Mohawk Territory and have a daughter, a son, and grandson. They like to share their knowledge in their community of Wahta and in the surrounding communities of Muskoka. They have given their time learning and living the ways of the Longhouse people for the last 40 years of their lives. Now as of present time they teach the culture to everyone in Glen Orchard Public School.
From Sap to Syrup: Brooklands Farm
The heart of any maple journey is the sugar bush, and Brooklands Farm outside Port Carling, on the pleasantly named Butter & Egg Road, offers something rare: authenticity passed down through six generations. For the Riley family, maple syrup isn’t just a product, it’s the first and most meaningful crop of the year, a tradition that connects them to the land and to their ancestors.
You’ll venture into the sugar shack where sap is gathered and transformed through patient hours of boiling. The steam rises sweet and thick, filling the air with the unmistakable scent of spring. You’ll learn the craft from those who know it best, understanding why small-batch syrup tastes different as it carries both flavour and ancestry in every drop.
Your visit concludes with a farmer’s breakfast, prepared by the family and served in their historic log home dating back to 1876. The meal is simple and generous: pancakes with fresh syrup, farm eggs, bacon, coffee strong enough to wake the forest. Around the table, stories will flow as freely as the syrup.
Home of Muskoka Chautauqua
Rooted in a century of tradition, Muskoka Chautauqua stands as one of the region’s longest-running and most iconic cultural institutions. Its story began in the 1920s, when Windermere emerged as Canada’s literary summer capital, a tranquil sanctuary where North America’s great creative minds gathered for intellectual exchange. Today, this vibrant arts community remains a focal point for personal growth and renewal, serving as a premier cultural hub where artists and leading thinkers share innovative ideas while enjoying Muskoka’s beautiful natural backdrop.
While renowned for its signature summer festival, which encompasses diverse programming including high-profile concerts to immersive art workshops and personal author talk series, the Muskoka Chautauqua experience extends beyond the warm months with the delivery of year-round programming that connects visitors with the region’s soul.
Throughout this March weekend, Muskoka Chautauqua has taken the best of its music, art and learning to provide entertainment through the weekend. Enjoy live music from local artist Leah Leslie and her constant companion, a 1976 Grit Laskin acoustic guitar. As well as a guided visual story telling by graphic recording artist Pamela Hubbard, capturing the spirit of the experience and creating a collective expression of the shared journey.
Whatever the season, our programming encourages a deeper, more authentic connection to the natural environment and rhythms of local Muskoka living.
A Journey Worth Taking
This package is more than a getaway – it’s a collaboration born from passion for the land, the flavours, and the stories that make Muskoka unique. Where maple forests, family farms, Indigenous wisdom, and historic resorts come together to celebrate the rhythms of the season.
In a world that moves too fast, maple season asks us to slow down. To notice when the sap begins to flow. To honour the hands that gather and transform it. To taste the forest in a single drop of syrup.
This is regenerative travel at its finest: celebrating tradition, supporting local livelihoods, and honouring the rhythms of nature at the very moment when winter releases its grip and spring begins.
The Itinerary
Friday — Arrive & Welcome
4pm Check in to your lakeview room at Windermere House.
5 – 6pm Gather fireside for a welcome with Wahta Mohawk Elders Lucia and Terry Sahanatien. Passed canapés and a warming drink in hand as stories, traditions and the spirit of maple season are shared. A rare and moving way to begin a weekend.
Evening Dinner at your own pace. The fire pits, saunas and hot tub are yours for the evening. Friday dinner is not included in your stay. The Windermere Pub is open noon – 10pm for meals and snacks.
Saturday — Forest to Farm to Table
8 – 10am Grab and go breakfast at Windermere House.
10am Board the activity bus from Windermere House to Brooklands Farm.
10:30am – Noon Step into the maple forest at Brooklands Farm. Six generations of syrup-making, a historic sugar shack, and the quiet rhythm of a working farm in full maple season. Dress warmly and wear suitable footwear for walking.
Noon – 1:30pm Sit down to a proper farm brunch inside the family’s 1876 log home. Local sausages, buckwheat pancakes, farm fried potatoes, maple beans in farm tomato sauce, fresh fruit salad — syrup drawn from trees you walked that morning poured over all of it. Mimosas, juice, coffee and tea.
1:30pm Board the activity bus back to Windermere House.
2pm onwards Free time to relax and enjoy the resort amenities
6:30pm A three-course maple-themed dinner at The Rosseau restaurant, thoughtfully built around the day’s journey from forest to table. Live music by Muskoka Chautauqua artist Leah Leslie.
Sunday — Reflect & Farewell
8 – 10:30am Breakfast at Windermere House.
10 – 11am Artist and facilitator Pamela Hubbard closes the weekend with a gentle guided reflection — a chance to sit with what moved you and decide what you want to carry home.
Thank you for reading all the way to the bottom! As a small thank-you, use MAPLE2026 for $100 off. I hope we’ll see you in March!
– Rachel Dawson, Administration & Travel Services Coordinator at TGCW
The Great Canadian Wilderness
TICO #50027320
3-1 Taylor Road Bracebridge, ON P1L 1W8
(705) 646-0490