Spring/Summer
Long Weekends Magazine
Just 13 miles from the downtown of Canada’s capital city lies a thriving, year-round Indigenous cultural agritourism destination. The 164-acre Madahoki Farm on Ottawa’s Greenbelt parklands offers seasonal experiences and events, an Indigenous marketplace, small farm animals to feed, a legacy trail, a kids play area, snowshoe rentals in the winter and a herd of Ojibwe Spirit Horses. This endangered breed of horse — the only one native to Canada — is smaller, has a stripe along its back, sports extra-furry ears and developed a double flap in its nostrils to breathe in the winter air.
The Madahoki Farm marketplace includes works from more than 40 Indigenous artists and craftspeople, including beadwork, medicine shields, candles, blankets, porcupine-quill baskets, smudge sticks, amethyst and abalone-shell jewelry, paintings, bannock (bread) mixes, cornhusk dolls, books, shawls, deer-hide drums and more.