Bring On The Bay

Thirty stationary sailboats anchored in line across Britannia Bay guide open water swimmers to Britannia Park. Bring On The Bay is an open water swimming event held on the freshwater expanse of the Ottawa River in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. The event features both a 1.5-kilometre dash and a 3-kilometre distance, welcoming participants of all ages and athletic backgrounds to race across the wide river bay. The 3-kilometre course sets off directly from the Nepean Sailing Club, tracing a sweeping line across the open water. Swimmers tackling the 1.5-kilometre event start from Britannia Park, following an abbreviated path. Both courses converge on the riverfront of Britannia Park, where friends, families, and cheering crowds gather along the water's edge to welcome each finisher out of the river.

Navigating the open bay is made remarkably straightforward thanks to an escort flotilla of approximately thirty sailboats stationed every hundred metres along the race corridor. In addition to cheering swimmers along the course, these anchored boats display clear distance markers to help you gauge your progress stroke after stroke. After tracking the sailboat line across the bay, swimmers on the 3-kilometre route encounter a decisive final navigation test: a sharp right-hand turn threading through a tight passage between a large turning buoy and a support kayak before aiming straight for the beach. Midsummer races typically greet swimmers with mild, comfortable freshwater conditions that suit both wetsuit and skin swimmers alike.

A passing southwest breeze can kick up a steady river chop, occasionally making the water bob under your stroke after the first five hundred metres. In seasons with high water levels, the opening seventeen hundred metres can feel like a muscular pull into the river's volume, followed by welcome relief along the final thirteen hundred metres into the protected bay. The gathering has deep community roots, having started fifteen years ago with a tight-knit field of just twelve swimmers. Over the seasons, the race has built a dedicated tradition for its ten-year veterans, permanently retiring their racing cap numbers in tribute to their loyalty, such as cap number one for Pierre Tessier and cap number two for Stephane Laurin.

The Ottawa River: post-glacial floodwaters and rapid currents

The waterway underneath you is the product of monumental post-glacial geology, flowing through a vast valley that became habitable roughly ten thousand years ago after the natural drainage of the prehistoric Champlain Sea. Within Ottawa, three major rivers converge, creating an aquatic nexus that has served as a central trading and travel corridor for thousands of years. Further down the urban waterfront, the Ottawa River meets the tributary Rideau River, highlighting the living power and constant movement of the regional river system.

Voyageurs, timber rafts, and the Rideau Canal waterway

Long before modern swimmers raced across Britannia Bay, the river served as the vital wilderness artery for early exploration, with Étienne Brûlé becoming the first documented European to navigate the Ottawa River in 1610. Rivalries flared on the water in 1835, when the Shiners—a faction whose name likely derived from the French word chêneur, meaning an oak cutter—physically blocked rival timber rafts on the river. The river's strategic transport importance led to the engineering of the Rideau Canal, designed to provide a secure military supply route between Montreal and Kingston while bypassing vulnerable stretches of the St. Lawrence River. Spanning 202 kilometres to connect the Ottawa River directly to Lake Ontario, the canal incorporates natural rivers and lakes into a continuous navigation channel.

Rather than cutting long artificial channels through rock, the canal utilized an ingenious slackwater design, building dams to raise water levels and submerge impassable river rapids. The finished route features forty-five locks across twenty-three stations, lifting vessels through an elevation rise of eighty-three metres from the Ottawa River to Upper Rideau Lake.

Shirleys Bay and the shoreline alvars

The river ecosystem preserves fragile aquatic habitats that depend entirely on natural hydrological changes. At Shirleys Bay, the shoreline preserves a biologically diverse alvar alongside one of the largest silver maple swamps along the entire Ottawa River. These extensive wetland complexes rely on regular seasonal fluctuations in river depth to sustain their delicate balance of native flora and aquatic life. When water levels recede during dry spells, exposed sandbars and clay flats emerge, creating fertile ground where rare wetland plants can germinate and thrive along the banks. As the river glides past sandy ribbons like Ottawa Beach, the public waterfront at Andrew Haydon Park, and the riverine Duck Islands, it maintains a rich mosaic right at the edge of the capital.

Britannia Park: sandy shores and the riverfront lawn

Race morning centres entirely around the water's edge, organized by the Nepean Sailing Club for the 3-kilometre distance. Watching the line of support sailboats motor out into their anchored positions gives swimmers a striking view of the aquatic highway awaiting them. At the finish line, Britannia Park provides the perfect natural amphitheatre for the end of the swim.

Lac Deschênes, swimmer numbers and the Britannia pier

Bring On The Bay takes place on Lac Deschênes in the Ottawa River, starting at the Nepean Sailing Club and ending at Britannia Park. The Nepean Sailing Club describes its most recent field as over 700 swimmers, 35 or more boats, and 70 or more kayaks, paddle boards and canoes. At the 2015 swim, a record 590 swimmers entered the water, and the finishers ranged in age from 11 to 73. Around 1900 the Ottawa Gas and Electric company extended the trolley line and created an amusement park at Britannia beach to draw weekend riders. By 1904 the trolley company had built a wide pier 1,000 feet long out into the river at Britannia. Britannia beach was described as ideal for bathing, since people could wade out almost to the end of the pier without danger.