2025 Conservation Areas Workshop

2024 Conservation Areas Workshop

2024 - Day 2

Keynote Speaker

TORI BAIRD

Tori has been canoeing whitewater for the last 10 years, navigating some of Ontario’s most challenging whitewater rivers: In 2015, she paddled the East Natashquan in Northern Quebec, in 2016 the Porcupine River in Northern Saskatchewan. And in 2017 she paddled the Mountain River in the Northwest Territories only a few days after completing an 8-day, 160km backpacking trek across the Rocky Mountains from Jasper to Grande Cache. Ever since having kids she has done her best to include them in her adventures.

After completing a solo backcountry canoe trip, she was inspired to launch her business Paddle Like a Girl in hopes of empowering other women. Paddle Like a Girl is a two-day paddling workshop for women, that Tori runs out of her property on the Magnetawan River. Her goal is to instil confidence in the participants to start planning and executing their own backcountry canoe trips. The workshops cover all the basics of backcountry canoeing, from trip planning and map reading to meal prep, waterproofing gear and fire lighting, but the main focus is on paddling skills.

Tori has contributed to Outpost Magazine, Explore Magazine, has been a guest on several podcasts, presented at London’s Paddle Shop and was featured in Export Development Canada’s profile of Nova Craft Canoe in 2019. Tori and her family are featured in the National Geographic TV show “Home in the Wild”.

2024 - Day 3 Keynote Speaker

ADAM SHOALTS

Adam Shoalts is a professional adventurer and Westaway Explorer-in-Residence at the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, and Outward Bound’s ambassador. His expeditions range from mapping rivers to archaeological projects, but Shoalts is best known for his long solo journeys, including crossing alone nearly 4,000 km of Canada’s Arctic. Named one of the “greatest living explorers” by CBC and even declared “Canada’s Indiana Jones” by the Toronto Star, Shoalts’s latest adventure was a 3,400 km solo journey from Lake Erie to the Arctic, the subject of his new bestselling book Where the Falcon Flies. His other books include Alone Against the North, A History of Canada in 10 Maps, and Beyond the Trees: A Journey Alone Across Canada's Arctic, and The Whisper on the Night Wind, all of them national bestsellers. He has a PhD from McMaster University in history, and in his free time, enjoys long walks in the woods. 

About the Conservation Areas Workshop

The Conservation Areas Workshop (est. 2007) is a training and development conference attended by more than 100 industry leaders in Conservation Land Management and Park Operations.

Supported by Conservation Ontario, attendees of the Conservation Areas Workshop (CAW) come together annually for networking, sharing best practices, training and building capacity for future conservation experiences.

Learning and training opportunities at the CAW adhere to our three foundational pillars:

People

Planning

Places

Session topics include but are not limited to:

  • Staff and visitor health and safety

  • Recreational opportunities and products

  • Innovative development and technology in outdoor recreation

  • Design elements of park infrastructure (signs, kiosks, pavilions etc.)

  • Ecosystem management including Species at Risk and Invasive Species

  • Visitor management and reservation system technology

  • Managing liability and insurance needs

  • Indigenous engagement

  • Enforcement and compliance

  • Forestry, arboriculture, and hazard tree management

  • Trail, bridge, and boardwalk building and facility infrastructure management

  • Property maintenance and operational plans

Additionally, the CAW provides annual site visits to Conservation Areas in Ontario, keynote speakers, an Exhibitor Marketplace, a Newcomers Welcome and more.

Host Authority

Each year, the Conservation Areas Workshop is planned by a volunteer committee of representatives from various Conservation Authorities. A host Authority takes on the responsibility of chairing (or co-chairing) the committee, overseeing the Workshop’s finances and coordinating the annual workshop. In 2024 the host Authority is the Niagara Peninsula Conservation Authority.