Next Hike

The next hike will be on Saturday, 18th August.

We meet in the Ballpark at Gillies Bay at 10:00am.

Last week was the very popular Texada Sandcastle weekend and no resident hikers managed to fit the usual Saturday hike into their schedules.  With no visiting hikers showing up either I decided to check out the trail situation in the area to the north of the Blubber Bay Road by myself.   From Van Anda I drove towards Blubber Bay and parked at the yellow gate on the road into the natural gas pipeline booster pumping station. I made slow progress and found it easier to walk on the rocky beach rather than in the forest.  I found several interesting things to photograph including the new species of tent caterpillar that has arrived in the last couple of years, some rock formations of scientific interest and some interesting specimens of the Seaside Juniper, Juniperus maritima.  This fairly large native tree manages to survive very well all along this stretch of coastline where it often grows on the most inhospitable outcrops of fractured limestone.  In my photo you can see one of these trees on the right, over thirty feet tall and yet perched on a rock ledge at the top of a low cliff. 

JD.

 

This view of Limekiln Bay looking south shows the coast line from near Glass Beach and Kiddie Point, almost to the southern limit at Marshall Point.