Next Hike

The next hike will be on Saturday, 25th June.

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

Last Saturday we were once again unlucky with the weather with rain coming down almost without a break from start to finish of the hike.  With still a few more days to go to the end of June the rainfall in Gillies Bay has already exceeded 100mm, so over four inches and perhaps something of a record perhaps.  We drove towards Davie Bay and parked just past Eagle Creek where the road going up to Thompson Rd branches off to the left.  The route is a steady climb with a couple of extra steep sections to reach the lunch spot at the top of Eagle Mountain.  It rained as we ate lunch and  we were high enough to be in low cloud so had no view at all.  

My photo this week was taken on our recent hike to Secret Beach.  The peeling brown skin like bark had started to come off a branch that had grown close to the ground for several feet before curving up to form almost a separate trunk. It is unusual to see the smooth wood that was exposed such a bright geen colour.

JD.

  

A curious Arbutus tree on the coastal trail north of Shingle Beach.

Next Hike.

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

We meet at the Ballpark in Gillies Bay at 10.00am

Last week we drove south towards Shingle Beach and parked on the roadside a short distance south of the V.I. power line.  Walking back north along the road, then south on the side road that ends at the mouth of Stromberg Creek we stopped at the beach long enough to have a group photo taken with a time delay setting that let everyone appear together in the shot.  The trail is quite slow going at times as some sections involve steep slopes both up and down and damp rocks have to be negotiated with great care. The rewards are in the views from the grassy bluffs, the old growth cedar giants and some very curious arbutus. At Yew Tree Bay where we left the trail to return to the vehicles there are both ancient yew trees and some extra large arbutus.

JD.

 

Texada Trekkers at Secret Beach at the north end of the new trail that starts at the Shingle Beach campground.

Next Hike

The next hike will be on Saturday,11th June.

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

Last week we had a near perfect day for hiking and headed south to visit a new viewpoint we had only discoved last year.  The spot was just as we remembered it and the view looking across the Salish Sea to Vancouver Island perhaps not quite as clear but impressive none the less.  To get to the viewpoint from Gillies Bay means driving for about forty-five minutes to the Fiveway Junction on the Anderson Bay Road.  From there it takes just over an hour to walk down the Cook Bay Cutoff Rd. and up the second side road on the left to where our short new path through the trees reaches the top of a very steep cliff and the view you see in my photo of the week.  The location is about 2,000ft above the sea and might be called the Upper Cook Bay Bluffs.

I think the large bird you can see gliding past not far below was a Turkey Vulture and the white flecks you can see on the water just behind it are the wakes of some of the racing sailboats. 

JD.

  Lasqueti Island from a viewpoint high above Cook Bay.  In the Sabine Channel directly below there were so many sailboats it must have been a race.

Next Hike

The next hike will be on Saturday, 4th June.

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

It looks as if we are going to have a warm sunny day for the hike this week.  Last week we were not so lucky and had another one of those days when it rains more or less continuously.  We kept the hike quite short and avoided any kind of trail with high grass or low bushes to stay as dry as possible.  We did have a dry spot for lunch but with a view over a gray sea under a gray sky there was nothing very exciting to see.

My photo this time is one I took on a hike we did on a much brighter day earlier this year.  Much of the southern end of Texada is rugged and more or less uninhabited land, but with often the most impressive scenery. We were on rocky bluff looking south over the narrow Sabine Channel that separates Texada from Lasqueti Island.  This is about the most narrow part and it would be interesting to be here late on a summer day when the cruise ships head through on their way north to Alaska.  The highest point on Texada, Mount Shepherd, is just out of the picture on the left.

JD.

The view south from a bluff high above Twin Beaches near Cook Bay. The high ridge on the left is in the South Texada Provincial Park. 

Next Hike

The next hike will be on Saturday, 28th May.
We meet at the Ballpark in Gillies Bay at 10:00am.

Last week we drove north along the High Road, then turned right and headed downhill to Pocahontas Bay. Parking at an intersection just up from the bay we started our hike going south on the old logging road called Pocahontas Main. This is once again in use as there has been a fair amount of fresh logging going on about three kilometres south of the bay. Our destination for lunch was at the end of a side road on the very small Taylor Bluff.

My photo this week was taken a couple of hikes ago when we were on our way down from the summit of Surprise Mountain, the highest point on the north end of Texada. The location was an open grassy bluff where we have seen a few plants of this flower in earlier years. This year there were far more plants than I had ever seen here before and many of them had clearly been in bloom not long ago, but only a couple of them had flowers left.
JD.

Next Hike

The next hike will be on Saturday, 21st May.

We meet at the Ballpark in Gillies Bay at 10.00am.

Last Saturday we met in Van Anda and drove past Priest Lake then onto the old haul road and took the turnoff that now has a smart iron street sign with the name Surprise Mt. Road.  We drove past the old Gem mine wast dump and parked in the wide grassy area where three roads meet.  Sometimes we take the right fork here that goes past the giant split rock, a giant eratic boulder, and approach the summit of the mountain from the north.  This time we headed on foot on the central road and took the route that approaches the summit from the north east. The view from the top includes the high ground that extends from Pocahontas in the north all the way south to the high point of the island, Mt. Shepherd.  

After lunch we set off on the trail that runs downhill to the High Ledges viewpoint and passes a couple of areas with specimens of some of our less common native plants including the dainty little Shooting Stars and the tough Indian Dream fern.  We tend to take our Arbutus trees pretty much for granted and only notice them if they are particularly twisted in shape or large in size.  This day we came across a medium small one which was remarkable for putting on a such a great display of its bright yellow flowers.  

JD. 

 This Arbutus was in peak bloom on the summit of Surprise Mountain. 

Next Hike — from Van Anda.

The next hike will be on Saturday, 14th May.

We meet at the Royal Canadian Legion parking in Van Anda at 10:00am.

Last week we drove south past Davie Bay and then turned left after the concrete bridge over Stromberg Creek then parking when we reached the gravel pit a short distance up past the Stromberg Falls parking place.  This is a pleasant hike, mostly in forest, that follows the main road climbing steeply most of the way up towards Thompson Road.  We did not go quite that far as the one side road on the right takes us under the power lines to the bases of two of the support towers  where a marked trail leads south along the hillside to a steep bluff with a lovely view of the sea and Mt. Arrowsmith on Vancouver Island.

My photo is one I took on our long recent hike in the Cook Bay area.  This cute treefrog was particularly bright green and very tame.  I'm not too sure, but I do believe it figured it was safe and sound sitting next to some leaves that matched it's own skin colour.  From just a short distance away it was certainly hard to spot as long as it remained perfectly still.

JD.

The local treefrogs do vary in colour quite a bit, and I thought this one was particularly bright green.