Snow Maze Near Winnipeg and Five More Ice Attractions

Six places within reach of Winnipeg where the attraction is the ice and snow itself, ranked by whether they repay the trip. The season for all of them runs roughly from January to the middle of March, and every one of them is at the mercy of a thaw.

The world's largest snow maze, St. Adolphe

A Maze in Corn builds it each winter at 1351 Provincial Road 200, about 25 kilometres south of the city, which is about half an hour from Crescentwood down Pembina Highway and straight on. Guinness measured the 2019 edition at 2,789.11 square metres on February 10 of that year and the record has stood since. The walls are two feet thick and taller than you are. Solving it takes about thirty minutes; most people stay one to two hours, because inside the maze there are five snow buildings with carvings in them, and outside it there is the Giant Luge at $3 a ride or $5 for an unlimited pass if you are nine or older, a tube run down Snow Mountain, sleigh rides on Saturday and Sunday afternoons from one until four at $5, and a warm-up barn with a fire and mini donuts. A Maze in Corn posts admission at $28 plus GST for ages 13 and up, $18 for 6 to 12, free for 5 and under. It has opened in late January in recent seasons and run to mid-March. First on this list because it is the only one that somebody built.

The Nestaweya River Trail at The Forks

In a good year the groomed trail on the frozen rivers runs about six kilometres, from the Hugo Docks on the Assiniboine in the streets north of Corydon out to Churchill Drive on the Red. It costs nothing, it is twenty minutes from most of the city, and it opens in January and closes in March with sections shutting and reopening in between as the ice allows. Skates rent for $8 for adults and $4 for children and seniors at the counter in The Forks Market Atrium. When the river is closed the two on-land rinks above the bank, the CN Stage Rink and the Canopy Rink, usually are not. The 38 Salter runs into The Forks seven days a week. Second because free and close beats spectacular when the windchill decides your afternoon for you. Our guide to the river trail covers how it is built and how to read a closure.

The Riley Family Duck Pond, Assiniboine Park

The duck pond in the middle of Assiniboine Park freezes into a skating surface, lit, surrounded by the park's winter light displays, and free. Hockey sticks and pucks are not allowed on it, which is the whole point: this is the ice for a six-year-old on their second day of skating, and for the adult holding them up. The shelter beside the pond is open daily from 7 a.m. to 10 p.m. for washrooms and for warming up, and the Winnipeg Trails Association has rented a limited number of skates there on Friday evenings from five until eight and on Saturdays and Sundays from noon until 6:30. Third, behind the river trail, only because it is one pond rather than six kilometres.

Snow sculptures at Whittier Park

Festival du Voyageur puts more than twenty snow sculptures on the grounds at Whittier Park in St. Boniface for ten days every February, around the Louis Riel Day long weekend, and the International Snow Sculpture Symposium carves most of them in the days before the gates open. In 2026 the symposium ran February 10 to 15 and the festival February 13 to 22. The sculptures stand among the palisades of Fort Gibraltar, so you get the reconstructed fur trade post in the same visit. This one is ticketed and the window is ten days wide, which puts it fourth; the sculptures themselves would rank higher. Dates for 2027 are at heho.ca, and our festival guide covers the rest of the grounds.

Ice fishing off Lockport and on Lake Winnipeg

The Lockport ice fishing village on the Red keeps plowed roadways and roughly twenty-six bays you can drive a car into and fish from without booking anything, which makes it the least ceremonious way to spend a winter day near the city. Out on Lake Winnipeg the draw is the greenback walleye, which average around twenty inches and run to ten pounds and more; licensed outfitters including Kannuk Outfitters guide trips there from January into April, starting around $450. Fifth, because unlike everything above it this one asks you to bring gear, hire a guide, or both, and to give it a whole day.

Ice shoves on Lake Winnipeg, if the wind obliges

Some years the wind pushes the lake ice onto the shore north of Gimli in ridges three metres high, and photographs of it circulate for a week. It needs a floating, mobile ice cover and a wind that holds for days, so it happens most often toward spring and it cannot be scheduled. Treat it as a bonus if you are in the Interlake anyway rather than a reason to drive up. It is last for one more reason: ice thinner than three inches will not hold a person at all, four inches is the walking minimum, and there is often open water close to shore under exactly the conditions that build the ridges.

Where to stay for a winter weekend

Our three-bedroom home is in Crescentwood, a few blocks south of Corydon Avenue. Pembina Highway picks up a few minutes south of the door and runs down to the snow maze; the Hugo Docks end of the river trail is about a ten-minute walk north; Assiniboine Park is about thirteen minutes west by car; Whittier Park is across the Red in St. Boniface. That spread is why a winter weekend here works better from a house than from a hotel downtown: you can drive out to St. Adolphe in the afternoon, be back for supper, and still walk to the river in the evening. Sunset in Winnipeg is about 5:16 p.m. on January 30 and has only reached 5:40 p.m. by mid-February, so afternoons are short and the thing you want is a short way back. The February long weekend and the festival dates around it are the busiest winter nights we take; our Airbnb listing shows what is open.