Central Ontario is a secondary region of Southern Ontario in the Canadian province of Ontario which lies between Georgian Bay and the eastern end of Lake Ontario. The population of the region was 1,070,644 in 2011; however, this number does not include large numbers of seasonal cottage country residents, which at peak times of the year swell its population to well in excess of 1.5 million. Although it contains many small and medium-sized urban centres, much of Central Ontario is covered by farms, lakes (with freshwater beaches), rivers or sparsely populated forested land on the southern edge of the Canadian Shield.