In response to the recent letter from a Singhampton resident complaining about rock climbing at Devil’s Glen in Grey County, and encouraging Moore St residents to rally against this user group, it is important to clarify a few facts about the climbing community at Lion’s Head.
For one, this community is incredibly small. In recent years, on a busy summer weekend, there might be 15-20 or so climbers at the cliff. On weekdays, it’s usually 5 or less. Compared to several hundred tourists hiking the lookout trail every day in the summer, climbers make up a mere fraction of total park users.
Additionally, most climbers are concentrated in small areas of the cliff, rather than wandering around the entire top edge as the hikers do.
The Lion’s Head climbing community has shown themselves to be useful stewards of the area, by packing out garbage bags of trash left by hikers on the trail, educating visiting tourists on leave no trace principles, and organizing community fundraisers to provide meals for seniors in the community during the pandemic.
The small but dedicated group of climbers (many of whom are now local homeowners themselves, and some who have lived in the Northern Bruce Peninsula for many generations) that climb at Lion’s Head regularly are invested in the long-term health and sustainability of the community and nature preserve, and look forward to maintaining and further developing the friendly relations with the local community that have been developed over the past decades.
Julia Cetnar
