For the fourth year in a row, Clearview Township will celebrate International Trails Day, and for the first time, the festivities will take place in Creemore, this Saturday, June 1.
As the “Clearview Trail Link,” the municipality’s own network of recreation trails, gradually becomes reality, previous celebrations have taken place in Stayner and New Lowell. This year, the trail-building effort will focus on connecting New Lowell to Creemore, so it seemed like the right time to bring the party to Creemore.
A joint effort of the Township Trails Committee, the Creemore BIA and the Creemore Farmers’ Market, the event will have a home base on Caroline Street East in front of the Station on the Green. In addition to mainstage entertainment from the likes of Zero Gravity Circus, the Danceroom and the Clearview Community Theatre (taking place between 9 am and 12:30 pm), there will be a healthy breakfast, a Kids’ Penny Carnival courtesy of Cardboard Castles, a downtown scavenger hunt hosted by the Clearview Library, the Clearview Fire Department dunk tank, an OPP bike rodeo, face painting and much more.
The main event, of course, will be a three-kilometre run, walk and wheel event, leaving the library at 10 am. Participants will head down Mary Street to George Street and onward to the Clearview 6/7 Sideroad before turning around and heading back.
At 6/7 Sideroad, people will get a good look at the most recent addition to the Clearview Trail Link, a trail that follows the back way out of town from Creemore to the Simcoe County Forest on the other side of Airport Road. While still a work in progress – the section awaits final grading – the trail will eventually take walkers and bikers to where the bulk of this summer’s trail work will take place. With the help of some federal grant money, the Township will be building a trail through the County Forest. Eventually, once some property issues are worked out, this trail will meet up with an already completed section just west of New Lowell.
The eventual goal of the Clearview Trails Committee, which includes chairperson Alex Hargrave, Peggy Hargrave, Ruth McArthur, Marie Leroux and Clearview Community, Culture, Recreation Co-ordinator Shane Sargent, is to link up all of the municipality’s settlement areas with each other and with neighbouring communities. Stayner and Collingwood were joined initially using the old rail bed, and an extension from Stayner to New Lowell is in the planning stage. Combine those two rail trails with the work being done now between New Lowell and Creemore, and the full picture starts to become clear.
“This is all about fitness, recreation and safety,” said Hargrave.“We’re pretty charged up about it.”
