Lock & Paddle: Join Peterborough’s annual paddling party
Have you ever wanted to go paddling and make a few hundred new friends? Play bumper boats in the tallest hydraulic lift lock in the world? Turn an entire weekend into one epic paddling celebration? Lock & Paddle is the event you’re looking for!
Parks Canada’s Lock & Paddle event at the Peterborough Lift Lock brings together paddlers of all skill levels from far and wide. Whether you’ve paddled a hundred times or not at all, you can be a part of this fun festival for all things paddling!
Here’s a look at our experience at Parks Canada’s Lock & Paddle event in Peterborough, and our top tips for how to plan a Lock & Paddle excursion of your very own. Have questions about planning your own outing to Lock & Paddle? Join our Facebook community!
Presented in partnership with Peterborough Tourism
What is Lock & Paddle?
Lock & Paddle is an annual event hosted by Parks Canada. Hundreds of canoes and kayaks paddle into a historic lock, which is then activated so everyone can travel up and down the lock together. The result is a fun atmosphere full of sound, colour, and celebration. This might be the world’s biggest paddling party!
The first-ever Lock & Paddle event took place at the Peterborough Lift Lock National Historic Site in 2016. Today, the event has expanded to include multiple lockages at the Peterborough Lift Lock as well as satellite events on the Rideau Canal in Ottawa and the Lachine Canal in Montreal.
Lock & Paddle usually coincides with Canada’s Parks Day, when national and provincial parks across the country offer a wide range of free public events. Parks Day typically takes place on the third Saturday in July. In 2025, the Parks Canada Lock & Paddle events in Peterborough, Ottawa, and Montreal are scheduled for Saturday, July 19.
This article focuses on the original Lock & Paddle event in Peterborough. We’ll add articles on the Ottawa and Montreal events once we’ve had a chance to experience them for ourselves.
Discover more things to do in Peterborough, Ontario’s lift lock city >
How to join Lock & Paddle in Peterborough
If you want to try participating in Lock & Paddle for yourself, there are a few steps you’ll need to follow.
Step 1: Get a boat
If you already own a canoe or kayak, this is easy: load it up onto your vehicle, and you’re ready to make your way to Peterborough. We needed a boat, so we booked a rental with Wild Rock Outfitters in downtown Peterborough. They have canoes and kayaks, and a limited number of kayak carts. Fortunately for us, a kayak cart was available for our rental, so we rolled the boat along the sidewalk toward our launch point.
There are multiple canoe and kayak rental locations available in Peterborough. We recommend securing your rental as early as possible since demand spikes considerably for the Lock & Paddle event.
Step 2: Get your boat into the water
Once you have a boat and you’ve reached Peterborough, your next big decision is where to put it into the water.
Most paddlers with some experience will find it easiest to pick a launch site near Little Lake. Since the lake is right in the middle of Peterborough, it offers the widest variety of options (and therefore the least complication with finding parking).
We opted to put in at Peterborough’s Millennium Park. It’s close enough to Wild Rock Outfitters that we could walk the kayak to the water. It also gave us a chance to grab lunch at the Silver Bean Café, a cornerstone in Peterborough’s Millennium Park for more than two decades. We fueled up with a delicious and healthy lunch and enjoyed what’s widely seen as the best waterfront patio in the city.
The dock behind the Silver Bean is open for the public to use to launch non-motorized watercraft as of this writing.
Other places to launch a canoe and kayak in Peterborough include Rogers Cove, the beach at Beavermead Park, Del Crary Park, and Eastgate Memorial Park. Only participants with accessibility needs are permitted to park and put in directly at the base of the Peterborough Lift Lock, where parking and launch space are limited.
Step 3: Get to the Peterborough Lift Lock
Once you’ve put in, your next task is to paddle to the Peterborough Lift Lock for the event. From your launch point, start by heading into Little Lake. (Some paddlers like to take a side trip to the Little Lake Fountain to enjoy a misting along the way on warmer days!)
Next, point yourself at the Canadian Canoe Museum, which is easy to spot at its new waterfront location. As you get close to it, you’ll see a lock station nearby, likely with a crowd of colourful boats already gathered. This is Ashburnham, Lock 20 on the Trent-Severn Waterway, a standard single lock that unloads into the canal leading to the Peterborough Lift Lock.
When we attended Lock & Paddle in 2024, our trip through the Ashburnham lock was like a Lock & Paddle preview. It was completely stuffed with boats, and some paddlers got their bubbles and water guns out early as they started cheering and having a great time. Before long, the lock’s gates opened and a few dozen paddlers were heading under the swing bridge and up the canal together.
Lock 20 tends to get busy quickly on Lock & Paddle days. Expect it to take one to two hours to paddle to the base of the Peterborough Lift Lock, depending on your launch point and skill level. The best plan is to arrive early, but if that’s not an option and there’s a long wait, a portage is available just to the left of the lock. You can walk your boat through and put into the canal on the other side to save some time.
Explore further by taking a road trip along the Trent-Severn Waterway >
Step 4: Appreciate the Peterborough Lift Lock
We need to give the Peterborough Lift Lock some love here. In Ontario, we have the world’s tallest fully hydraulic lift lock right in our own backyard!
The Peterborough Lift Lock opened in 1904. With its two chambers, it lifts boats 19.8 metres (65 feet) into the air. It’s operated entirely on hydraulics: water is added to the upper chamber to make it heavier so it will descend, which in turn lifts the opposite chamber. The only power used to operate the Peterborough Lift Lock is to raise and lower the gates. How cool is that?!
This was an amazing feat in physics when the lock opened well over a century ago, and it remains an engineering marvel today.
Step 5: Load up!
The Lock & Paddle event begins with some speeches and safety briefings. Before long, it’s time to load up the tubs. Be sure to pay attention to Parks Canada staff throughout this process. They’ll deliver directions to ensure everyone can participate safely and focus on having a great time.
At first you’ll actively paddle toward the lift lock, but after a while you’ll find everyone just sort of drifts into place. There’s plenty of bumping and sloshing as Parks Canada staff and fellow paddlers work to jam as many boats into the tubs as possible. In 2024, Lock & Paddle in Peterborough set two new records: there were 410 vessels in the two tubs at the same time, and 625 boats participated in the event!
Once there’s absolutely no room left in the tubs, the gate closes and the party begins! As the chamber starts to lift, you’ll be surrounded by cheering paddlers tossing beach balls, blowing bubbles, shooting each other with water guns, and chatting with neighbours who instantly become new paddling friends. It’s especially fun when the lock’s two tubs pass one another mid-lockage and people shoot water back and forth!
Unless you happen to be at the end of the tub closest to the city, you won’t necessarily get a great view out of the lift lock during Lock & Paddle. But the coolest part comes afterward when the photos are released. Be sure to smile for the cameras and Parks Canada-authorized drones overhead. You can seek out these images online after the event and find yourself among the happy and colourful crowd!
Our top tips for enjoying a safe and fun Lock & Paddle
Lock & Paddle is a bucket-list event for every canoe and kayaking enthusiast. Here are our best tips to help you prepare for your Lock & Paddle experience so you can focus on having a great time!
Tip #1: Bring a hard-sided, non-motorized watercraft
For the Lock & Paddle event, the Peterborough Lift Lock and the canal leading up to it from the south are closed to motorized watercraft. This is a paddle-only party! Be sure to bring either a canoe or a kayak, and make sure it’s hard-sided. Inflatables of any kind, including floaties and inflatable kayaks, are not permitted, nor are stand-up paddleboards. (Once you see how much jostling goes on in the locks, you’ll quickly understand why!)
Tip #2: Bring your essential safety equipment
While Lock & Paddle is a fun and light-hearted event, it does take place on federally managed waterways. You’ll therefore be expected to follow established rules and regulations.
Every person on board will need to wear a personal flotation device (PFD) for the duration of the event. Standing in your watercraft at any time during loading and lockage is not permitted. You’ll need to have a bilge pump or bailer bucket, a whistle, and a tow rope on board, depending on the safety equipment requirements for the watercraft you choose.
There are staff patrolling the water watching for these things, so arriving prepared will save you time and hassle.
Tip #3: Enjoy Lock & Paddle sober
Lock & Paddle is a great party, but it’s a sober one! Drinking or drugs and boating of any kind don’t mix. Keep the festive atmosphere going and save the imbibing for after the event.
Tip #4: Arrive early
While the lift lock will keep moving until everyone has had a turn, the reality of Lock & Paddle is arriving early provides the best experience while people are at their most enthusiastic. (If you ask us, the second tub is better than the first… not that we’re keeping score or anything.) Watch the Parks Canada website for updates on the event schedule, and allow plenty of time to park, unload, and make your way to the lift lock.
Depending on your starting point and skill level, it can take one to two hours to paddle to the Peterborough Lift Lock from other points in the city. This is especially true if you’ll need to paddle through Little Lake and the Ashburnham lock as there may be delays if things get busy. Work backwards from Parks Canada’s schedule and time your arrival accordingly.
Tip #5: Lock & Paddle is a rain-or-shine event
Lock & Paddle goes ahead regardless of the weather, so arrive prepared. On sunny days, it gets very hot very quickly out on the water. Bring a hat and sunglasses, load up on sunscreen, and pack more water than you think you could possibly need (i.e., at least a litre per person). On rainy days, a kayak skirt, rain jacket, and/or poncho will make things more pleasant. Be sure to wear your weather gear under your PFD so everything functions properly in an emergency.
Tip #6: Bring the fun!
A big part of what makes Lock & Paddle special is the jovial atmosphere. If you want to be a part of it, you can wear a costume — we had a group of pirates in our tub! — or bring a bubble gun, water gun, a beach ball or similar inflatable to bounce around, or come up with something different. As long as it’s safe on the water and for other participants, it’s fair game!
Tip #7: Grab a memento
In 2024, Parks Canada staff along the canal handed out commemorative stickers. You could start a collection, or you could even put yours on your canoe or kayak to keep track of how many Lock & Paddle events you’ve done!
Tip #8: Go for the triple crown
Lock & Paddle has been held at the Peterborough Lift Lock since 2016. In 2024, new Lock & Paddle events launched at two more historic canals managed by Parks Canada. An annual Ottawa Lock & Paddle event now takes place at Heartwells, locks 9 and 10 of the Rideau Canal. The Montreal Lock & Paddle event is held at Saint-Gabriel, lock 3 of the Lachine Canal.
If you successfully attend all three events, you’ll earn bragging rights as being among the first to complete the Lock & Paddle triple crown!
Turn Lock & Paddle into a paddling weekend in Peterborough and The Kawarthas
If you just can’t get enough paddling and you want to take your Lock & Paddle experience a step further, consider a paddle-packed weekend in Peterborough and The Kawarthas! Here are a few suggestions.
Visit the newly redesigned Canadian Canoe Museum
The Canadian Canoe Museum has a new home on the shores of Little Lake in Peterborough. Add context to your Lock & Paddle weekend by learning about the canoe’s role throughout human history.
Take a paddling excursion with Lovesick Kayaking
Just a half hour north of Peterborough, enjoy a half-day or full-day kayaking excursion with Alex Grant from Lovesick Kayaking. He has a variety of tours available, from trips across Lovesick Lake to views of Burleigh Falls and beyond. Alex can adjust the day’s itinerary based on your desires and skill level to ensure you have a great time.
Combine a Lovesick Kayaking tour with a stay at the Burleigh Falls Inn. The inn offers a fantastic package that includes two nights of accommodation, a hearty breakfast, a boxed lunch for your tour, and a three-course dinner in the historic dining room or patio. (If you’re doing this the day before Lock & Paddle as we did, be sure to save some energy for the big event!)
Explore this Burleigh Falls Inn stay and kayaking tour package >
Enjoy a home-run patio dinner at the Canoe & Paddle Pub
Whether or not paddling is your theme, the Canoe & Paddle Pub is an essential stop. This family owned and operated pub in the village of Lakefield has been slinging some of the region’s best fare for more than a decade.
You’ll also want to stop here in summer if you’re a baseball fan. The patio is lined with the very same Astroturf the Toronto Blue Jays played on when they won the World Series!
Catch a free live concert at Peterborough Musicfest
Lock & Paddle is traditionally held on a Saturday, which also happens to be one of the two nights each week when you can catch a free live concert at Peterborough Musicfest throughout the summer months. Plan to stay in Peterborough overnight and catch the Saturday night concert at Del Crary Park. You’ll become part of the longest-running free summer concert series in Canada and nearly 40 years of music history!
Learn more how Peterborough Musicfest makes live music accessible for everyone >
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