Sunday, August 4, 2013

Roberts Memorial Provincial Park

Roberts Memorial Provincial Park is located 15 km south of Nanaimo. From Highway 1, take the Cedar Road exit, then turn on to Yellowpoint Road. Follow Yellowpoint Road until you see the familiar wooden Provincial Park sign.
Trail along a sandstone ledge: Roberts Memorial Park
Trail along a sandstone ledge: Roberts Memorial Park
Right behind the sign is a decent sized parking lot with a notice board that includes a map of the park and other useful bits of information.

The trail to the beach starts right behind the notice board. This 1-kilometer trail takes visitors through a traditional West Coast forest before arriving at the beach overlooking scenic Stewart Channel. 
Cascadia surveys her domain: Roberts Memorial Park
Cascadia surveys her domain: Roberts Memorial Park


The beach at Roberts Memorial Park is unique. Rather than the more common rock or pebble beach, or the idealized sandy beach, this beach features a series of sandstone ledges. Thus, walking this beach is as easy as walking on a city sidewalk.
Sandstone "beach": Roberts Memorial Park
Sandstone "beach": Roberts Memorial Park
And, for sunbathers, there are plenty of clean, smooth surfaces to put a towel upon. Clearly that's what attracts the Steller’s and California sea lions, who haul out to bask in the sun on these unique sandstone ledges during the summer months.

Saturday, August 3, 2013

Hemer Provincial Park

Hemer Provincial Park, off Cedar Road

Tree fungus (with slug underneath)
Tree fungus (with slug underneath)

Holden Lake
Holden Lake

Thursday, August 1, 2013

Departure Bay

Looking across Departure Bay, floating in a kayak. For a more pedestrian view of Departure Bay and it's parks, follow the links (LINK: DEPARTURE BAY). In this picture, the island in the background is Jesse Island.
Looking across Departure Bay, floating in a kayak
Sailing out of Departure Bay

Wednesday, July 31, 2013

First post in this blog about Nanaimo parks

First post in the blog about Nanaimo parks: a stroll down the centre of Neck Point Park. The objective of this blog is to feature the major parks in and around Nanaimo. Each of the major parks will be given a page of it's own. The blog posts themselves will be a rather random selection of photos taken at the parks, with links to the relevant pages. For example, this post about Neck Point is also linked to the corresponding NECK POINT page (see page index above).

Neck Point Park
Neck Point Park