Parksville
Mid August Trip
to the Mid Island
Rathtrevor Beach
My parents were coming down island from Courtney so we bought some
picnic fixings and met them at the Rathtrevor for lunch and walk
on the sand at low tide. Being late August, the weather was
hot and the sun was bright. We found a picnic table in the
shade and enjoyed lunch.
Rathtrevor has a wide sand beach that goes on
and on at low tide. The sand has scattered rocks that hide
crabs and snails. The kids have played here before so they
know the wildlife.
When you get to the waters edge you can see
deeper water wildlife washed up on shore. Today we found a
Jellyfish laid out on the sand.
If the tide is really low, you can get to the sand dollar
zone. Sand dollars don't do well in the warm sand so you
sometimes have to walk up to your knees to see the sand dollars.
Surprisingly we have never been caught in the rising tide. My
parents had to get down island so we turned around, walked back to
the cars and went back to our separate homes.
Parksville Beach Festival
Most summers there is a beach festival in
Parksville and a large area of Sand Castles that artists built at
the start of the festival. Every year they have a different
theme.
Day Trip to Lasquetti
When I was a kid there was no Inland Island
Highway and you would slowly miander the single lane road passing
through every community on your way up island. After
Parksville, before Qualicum beach, there is a passenger only ferry
to Lasquetti. It was one of those ferries I had never
taken. This trip, that was going to change!
Lasquetti is a bit of an outlier Gulf Island. BC ferries
does manager the ferry contract, but the ferry (foot passenger and
bicycles) is operated by a contractor. The Island has Telus
landlines, but doesn't have BC Hydro power or any sort of water
connection. There aren't cell phone towers, but much of the
island have cell coverage. On a busy day, the ferry runs 4
trips. Our plan was to rent electric bicycles but that fell
through when the company discovered two of our party aren't adults
- apparently you can't rent an electric bike to a teenager!
Lasquetti is 30km from end to end so there is no way we were going
to walk it.
We got on the ferry and 45 minutes later we were in False Bay.
Apparently the area around the dock in
False Bay is called "Downtown". There is a general store /
cafe, a pub with hotel rooms and a small store with an ATM.
We went into the general store, got snacks for the kids and tried
to come up with a plan.
We found a
sign with the number for a "taxi" company and gave them a
call. Their one car was already out and the dispatcher
couldn't contact them where they were on the island, but when they
did get into a cell phone zone and were done with their current
passengers, they would call me back. We decided to explore
downtown. There is effectively a bakery farm stand with a wide
variety of cookies and other baked goods. There is a home
goods store open 3 days a week for 12 hours a week total and it had
a little private ATM connected to it. There is no bank on the
island, but the store did take bank cards.
Best case the car would be available in an hour so we decided to
walk down the road from the ferry terminal and check out the local
attractions. Even close to the ferry terminal there are homes
(no BC Hydro) and farm stands and lots of blackberries growing by
the road.
There is an Arts Center with a showing curringly on. The door
was open but no one was in so we respectfully took a look at the
work. I was impressed with the little gas stove for making
tea. A little further down the road was a post office (Not all
Gulf Islands have one) and the recycling depot with a second hand
store.
The hour went by quick and the taxi service was actually
available! We wanted a reasonable trip so we picked two
destinations - first Boot Point Regional Park (a beach with a view
of Texada Island). This park has an arch for weddings and
apparently it does get used. The beach itself had some great
tidepool rocks with a lot of kelp crabs.
Our second destination was Spring Bay - just down the road.
This is a rocky beach. Our taxi driver told us stories of
living on Lasquiti. She was young and had training on care
giving for seniors, but that wasn't enough work for a living.
She also was an artist, was the driver for her taxi company, ran the
ATM with her partner and her partner did a lot of work shipping
construction supplies to the Island. Spring Bay was clearly
money - the homes here were beautiful and nearly on the beach.
On the way back to the ferry terminal we stopped at a farm
stand. This was both bigger than what you find on a southern
Gulf Island (they could hold enough produce for 20 families) but
also rougher (much of it was just stacked pallets). The fruits
and veggies looked amazing.
As there are at best 4 sailings a day, we wanted to be sure we
weren't going to be there overnight. (There is a 7 room hotel
by the ferry). As we took the ferry back we could see the
smoke from a forest fire burning on Vancouver Island.
First time to Lasqueti and we left most of the island
unexplored. I wouldn't be surprised if I come back.
Denman Island
Lasqueti
and Denman are quite a contrast. Lasqueti has a population of
about 500 people, has gravel roads and very limited water.
Denman is about 60% of the area, but all the roads are paved and car
service ferry runs every hour. Both Islands have elementary
schools, but Denman also has a hardware store, a several
lakes. Most impressive, the ferry from Vancouver Island to
Denman actually pulls itself on cables between the islands.
This means of transport is apparently 4 times more efficient than
propellers.
The goal
today was to go to the Denman Art Studio Tour. That said, we
didn't bring a lot with us so our first stop was the farmers market
in the center of the Island to pick up some supplies. The kids
found Mango's on a stick (not grown locally) but there was a lot
that was grown or produced on the island.
The Denman Art Studio Tour:
I have been on a studio tour of Denman before so I wanted to
visit some old favorites as well as some new studios. Our
first stop was Lisa Nielsen Geddes - a painter. Her home was
amazing with a beautiful view of the straight to Vancouver
Island. I generally don't like taking photos of people's art
(that belongs to them), but I figure the contents of their studio is
fair game if there isn't a sign saying no photography.
Our next tarets Ember Blaira Art (I didn't take photos but I should
have) and Gordon Hutchens Pottery - probably the most famous person
on the tour. His studio is a bit of a walk in but the grounds
have pottery hiding in the foilage which makes me happy.
Gordon's
studio is amazing and his working area shows a careful attention to
process. Both my mother and now my wife own pieces by Gordon.
We generally traveled North to South. Some of the art
galleries were effectivly second homes on amazing ocean view
homes. Others were workshops on larger interior
properties.
Again, I don't add much if I take a photo of someones art display,
but I'm happy with spaces, tools and materials. Perhaps it's a
weird rule for someone who does art crawls, but it takes all kinds.
We visited Jayne Fogarty and Peter
Smallwood. They had amazing baskets (now one in our house) but
what really caught my attention was the bird feeder. They had
a tray of sunflower seeds out and several Red Breasted Nuthatches
were making frequent trips to take a few seeds and then fly back to
a nest or hiding hole to put the seed away. I was happy to
walk back to my car and pick up my tripod and long lens.
We finished our tour at Lynsey Paterson. She has the cutest
little cottage just a few blocks from the beach. The kids were
done with art so we drove down to Fillongley Provincial Park and
used a beach access to take in the view of Hornby Island. The
ferries back to Vancouver Island are frequent so we could basically
go when we wanted, and after a play on the beach we drove back to
Parksville.
Paradise Mini Golf and Fun Park
Our Air B&B was just down the street from the Mini Golf
course. We left home just before sunset and signed up for 18
holes.
The kids liked the Mini Golf so much that they signed up for time on
the bumper boats to get each other wet.
Quality Foods Festival of Lights Fireworks
The Parksville Beach
festival wrapped up this weekend and to celebrate there is a
fireworks show. This seams to be a one night only kind of
event that we just happened to be in town for. We thought it
was going to be a drop off (me and the Kids) but amazingly Helen
found a parking spot so we all picked a spot on the beach and waited
for the show!
The average age in Parksville is 55 years old and the music
selection for the fireworks reflected that - my kids didn't
recognize a single song. The crowd was really well behaved and
the fireworks we well choreographed. Thank you Quality Foods
for the show!
The next day we packed up and headed back to Vancouver!
Tags: Parksville(6), fruit(5), mini golf(3), fireworks(3), stand(3), waterfall(3)
People: Nara(6), Claira(4), Helen(2), Janet(2), Lloyd(2), Marcus(1)
From: John Harvey Photo > Parksville
Last Modified Saturday, July 11th, 2026 at 09:14:31 Edit
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