Cottage boats idle off a large sandy beach at Balsam Lake Provincial Park, where a buoyed swim area opens onto the Trent-Severn Waterway. You swim inside the buoys and watch the boat traffic beyond them, cottage country moving past on the same chain. You can rent a canoe, kayak, or stand-up paddleboard at the beach and stay on that water all afternoon.
Walleye and bass are the usual catch from the park, from shore or from a canoe you rented at the beach. Easy day-trip hiking trails take a quieter morning off the water. A first day can be a paddle, a swim, and a short walk without packing up camp.
The Trent-Severn Waterway is the spine of a Kawartha week, the lock system that ties these lakes together. You boat from Balsam Lake Provincial Park onto that chain and spend the day on the water. Fenelon Falls and Bobcaygeon are the town stops on that system.
Night one is the park's own campground, on the same property as the beach. Campsites with and without electricity take tents and RVs, and walk-in sites are available too.
Ontario Parks accepts reservations five months in advance as of September 2026, so the pad is the booking you make before the van. The site type decides the vehicle, and summer is when the hookup pads go first.
Emily Provincial Park
From Emily Provincial Park you boat and paddle the Trent-Severn Waterway from a different Kawartha shore. You can fish from the park as well. Fall camping here is for the colour, the late season worth aiming at on purpose.
Emily splits the overnight across four campgrounds. Hilltop, Hill, and Circle take tents through large trailers, and many of those sites have electrical hookups. If you need more sleeping room than a campervan, look at RV rentals in Kawartha Lakes. Cedars is tent-only and non-electrical, so it is the wrong pad for a van.
On Lake Simcoe, Orillia is the overnight at Mara and McRae Point.
Kirkfield Lift Lock
Two water-filled tubs at the Kirkfield Lift Lock trade height on metal frames, one rising as the other descends, and you watch it from the lockstation. Parks Canada calls it the second highest hydraulic lift lock in the world. The frames are steel, the same job as Peterborough's concrete towers done in metal.
You come for the day and leave. Parks Canada does not recommend camping at the lockstation. Sleep at Balsam Lake or Emily, the two parks that take the van overnight.
Paddle-in camping in the Kawartha Highlands is a Peterborough trip.
South of the Kawarthas, Oshawa is the Lake Ontario overnight at Darlington.