Kettle Lakes Provincial Park, Provincial park with kettle lakes in Cochrane District, Canada

Kettle Lakes Provincial Park is a recreation park about 30 kilometres east of Timmins, in northeastern Ontario, administered by Ontario Parks. Twenty of its 22 lakes are kettle lakes, small deep hollows left when buried ice blocks of the retreating Laurentide glacier melted roughly 12,000 years ago. The glacier also left eskers and erratics, and the lakes sit among forests of jack pine with balsam fir, red and white pine, white and black spruce, trembling aspen and white birch.

The landscape dates to the retreat of the Laurentide Ice Sheet about 12,000 years ago, when buried ice blocks melted and left the kettle basins. The retreating ice also left eskers and erratics across the site. The sources consulted give no founding date for the park; it is administered by Ontario Parks as a recreation park 30 km east of Timmins.

The park lies within the traditional territory of Indigenous peoples of the Timmins area, who hunted and gathered across this northern landscape long before it became a recreation park. Today the kettle lakes, eskers and pine forests remain part of that wider homeland.

The park provides two campgrounds with 139 campsites total, plus trails for hiking and biking to explore the landscape. Visit during warmer, snow-free months if possible, and reserve camping spots ahead of time to ensure availability.

The retreating Laurentide ice sheet also left eskers and erratics in the park, not only the kettle lakes. Twenty of the 22 lakes are kettles, each marking where a buried ice block melted. Look for these gravel ridges and dropped boulders while hiking.