Living your day to day life as a new Cornwall resident, you will discover that there is hardly any traffic getting around the city either by walking, biking, public transit or driving. Visiting other villages or towns in the Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry United Counties and nearby cities can also easily be done by car. This ease of travelling may entice you to explore and do more.
I found that there’s plenty of activities and events to participate in during your spare time if you search and follow the groups and pages on Social Media that interests you. Here are some suggestions: The City of Cornwall, Cornwall Tourism, SDG Tourism, 1045 Fresh Radio, Boom 101.9, Cornwall Public library, Benson Centre, Cornwall Civic Centre, Sip & Scoup Performance Centre, Big Ben Ski Centre, Cornwall United Basketball Association, Cornwall Gymnastics Club, Own the Ice Hockey Inc., Cornwall Minor Hockey Association, Seaway Valley Soccer Club, Cornwall Baseball, Cornwall Minor Football Association, BGC Cornwall/SDG, EarlyON Child and Family Centre SD&G, Scouts Canada Voyageur Council, Cornwall Community hospital Foundation, Centre ON y va Francophone de SDG, ACFO-SDG, The Optimist Club of Cornwall, The Kinsmen Club of Cornwall, Cornwall Gaming, Adele & Bella’s Dance+, Beat Central Dance Company Cornwall, Studio C Dance school, Undefeated Mixed Martial Arts, SDG Taekwondo, Seaway Valley Theatre Company, Aultsville Theatre, Social Development Council of Cornwall and Area, The Port Theatre, Cline House Gallery, Cornwall Art Hive, Cornwall Square, Mohawk Council of Akwesasne, Sky Studios Fitness, Summit Health & Fitness Club, Quest PTS Strength Training, Fit4Less, Planet Fitness, Cornwall Community Museum, Raisin Region Conservation Authority and Saunders Hydro Dam Visitor Centre.
For those nature enthusiasts, there are several trails available for hiking, running, cross country skiing, snow shoeing and mountain biking such as Lamoureux Park and The Riverside Trail, Guindon Park, Gray’s Creek Conservation Area, Cooper Marsh Conservation Area, Upper Canada Migratory Bird Sanctuary and Long Sault Parkway. There’s even a Cornwall Outdoors Club de Plein Air you can join and through that you can find out more information about group hikes, walks, connecting with a rowing team, Dragon Boat team and more.
If you have your passport handy, you can cross the border and visit the town of Massena in New York about twenty minutes away. Other notable drivable U.S. places are: Malone, NY which is about an hour away, Lake Placid, NY and Plattsburgh, NY are about two hours away and about three hours away, you can venture into either Burlington, Vermont, Jay Peak resort in Vermont or Syracuse, NY.
Also nearby to Cornwall is The Mohawk Nation at Akwesasne that straddles the intersection of international (United States and Canada) borders and provincial (Ontario and Quebec) boundaries on both banks of the St. Lawrence River. Although divided by an international border, the residents consider themselves to be one community and they keep separate police forces due to jurisdictional matters and national laws. The two languages spoken there are Mohawk and English.
If you’re like me and prefer bigger cities, a day trip to either Montreal or Ottawa which is about a sixty to eighty minutes drive each way is definitely doable. Then when you return to Cornwall area, you can appreciate the simplicity of living in a smaller city.
Thank you for reading my opinion piece on life as a newcomer to Cornwall; last month I wrote about how my family decided to relocate here. With our heart and mind open, we have been enjoying this friendly city so far. If you’d like to reach out to me, I can be found on Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok and WhatsApp.
