Overview:
Fairwood Island is located in the midst of an area of great natural beauty in the Georgian Bay, in the Archipelago of islands at Pointe au Baril, Ontario.
Fairwood has provided an remarkable heritage for the descendants of Thomas Urquhart Fairlie and Isabel Shaw-Wood Fairlie who assembled the island over decades following the initial purchase of OK Point by Mary Shaw-Wood in 1906.
The island landscape contains many unusual features, including three internal lakes which support a range of wild life including beaver, otter, deer, bear, ancient turtles and colonies of birds. The windswept beauty of the West End has provided inspiration for some of Canada’s foremost artists.
The pre-Cambrian rock of Fairwood has been glaciated smooth and the spare soil supports a very specific and complex ecosystem. The geology is remarkable and includes the grouping of potholes around Cleopatra’s Bathtub on the east end as well as many peculiars and boulder anomalies spread by the glaciers.
Over the generations an extensive system of pathways has been developed and maintained to encourage exploration and a growing sensitivity to all of the wide range of natural phenomena that Fairwood harbours.
Following a great fire thought to have ravaged the island around 1860 and the logging that took place in the 1890’s the island has been cleared of debris and reforested over many years.
Over six generations later the island has remained in the hands of an extended family which includes Fairlies, Soleckis, Schellenbergs, Fyshes, Saegerts and Darlingtons.
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