You’d think on an island as small as Denman, a park as big as Denman Island Provincial Park, 561 hectares (2.2 sq miles) would be easy to find.  But no.  This park was well-marked on our maps (we had a boundary map, trail map, BCAA map and the map given to us by the nice lady at the ferry who took our money).  In spite of that, we found no signs of the actual park.

Camping buddies Rick and Deanna, husband Bob and I were camping at Fillongley Provincial Park, also on Denman, and were looking forward to checking out Denman Island Provincial Park, a relatively new provincial park established in 2013 through several land acquisitions and Crown land transfers.

Several green squares on the map represented the provincial park, and somewhere in the middle of one was Chicadee Lake, a small blue guitar shape with trails emerging from it.  We assumed it was in the provincial park.  Even the official Provincial Park Website stated that the Chicadee Lake watershed was included in the park boundary.  http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/bcparks/explore/parkpgs/denman_isl/

Following the map, we stopped at the road we were sure led to Chicadee Lake.  The large brown wooden signed named the area “Winter Wren Wood”, owned by the Denman Conservancy Association.  No Provincial Park sign.

Mildly confused, we decided to check out this “Winter Wren Wood” and drove to the end of the lane.  And there was the lake!

Chickadee Lake is very small and serves as a water reservoir for several homes in the area.  A short, 20 minute interpretative loop trail led us through Winter Wren Wood, a forest of large Coastal Douglas Fir, fallen trees covered with green springy moss, an underbrush of fragrant indigenous growth and small signs along the ground that named many of the indigenous plants and vegetation.  It was a wonderful walk, peaceful and green.  Some of the spring flowers were in bloom, many were in full foliage. We were glad not to have missed this little gem.

We have yet to find the entrance to Denman Island Provincial Park, so the question remains, did we or did we not enter Denman Island Provincial Park boundary?  We will look for it again when we return to Denman Island.

Trail map: http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/bcparks/explore/parkpgs/denman_isl/denman-isl-trails.pdf?v=1497794138903

Boundary map :  http://www.env.gov.bc.ca/bcparks/explore/parkpgs/denman_isl/denman-isl-boundary.pdf?v=1497794138903

Here is my growing list of the parks visited as I continue my quest to visit all 648 BC Parks!!

https://648bcparks.ca/my-bucket-list-places-i-have-visited/