Fossli Provincial Park is a day-use only park just west of Port Alberni on Vancouver Island. The park itself is 130 acres, but the main feature is a 2.1km (or about a mile) long trail through second-growth forest that leads to a small picturesque beach.

My camping buddy Trish and I explored several trails while camping at Stamp River Provincial Park, and the Fossli Provincial Park trail was one of them.   The road to the trailhead is an active logging road, about 1/2 hour from Stamp River. The park is not well-marked, just a 6″ x 6″ post with Fossli written down it.  Park on the side of the road. There are no designated parking spots.

While not the most rugged trail we have hiked, this one still had its challenges.  It is very rocky with exposed boulders, steep inclines and declines.  But don’t let that discourage you! While this is not a trail for baby strollers, there were young children on the trail, and they were having a grand time jumping over roots, playing King of the Castle on the boulders, and running down the inclines, with mom or dad chasing after them, bandages at the ready.

A short walk from the entrance you will see a fork in the trail (figuratively, not literally). Keep to the left and your adventure begins!  A suspension bridge crosses the lovely St. Andrew’s Creek.

This is a salmon-spawning creek.  The best time to view the salmon is in the fall.

The trail continues on the other side of the bridge and leads to another path.  Here you can choose to continue the trail you are on, or take the alternative path along the Creek Trail.  Both lead to the same place.

From here, you can also see the waterfalls, for which the park was named.  Fossli, or fosseli, means something like “waterfall in the valley” in Norwegian, and was named by an early settler, Mr. Faber.  Mr. Faber sold the land to Helen and Amour Ford who, in 1974, donated the land to the province.  Unfortunately, my photos of the waterfall didn’t turn out.  I will add more when I return to Fossli!

We chose to stay on the upper path. The Creek Trail looked more rugged than the one we were on, but that is from a distance, and I don’t know for sure what it was like.

The trail winds through a deciduous forest, with Big Leaf Maples at least 20 m or 60ft high bearing leaves twice the size of a woman’s hand (mine). It was easy to stumble on the large rocks and small boulders along the path.  We were so mesmerized by the thickness of the forest, the beautiful lush ferns, dangling Spanish moss, and the views of the creek that peeked out between the trees, that we didn’t spend much time looking at our feet.  We were accompanied with the sounds of the rushing water almost all the way to the beach.

The best part came at the end of the trail.  We turned a corner, and there, right in front of us was Sproat Lake.

One moment we were surrounded by forest and the next we were out in the open, staring at the Beaufort Mountain Range across the lake.   We sat on a log and soaked in the view.  The shoreline was muddy with plenty of freshwater eelgrass, bulrushes, and other swampy plants, not ideal for swimming. But it was peaceful and quiet.

But we had been promised a beach perfect for swimming, so we backtracked on the trail and looked for another turnoff.  We turned down a trail about 20 m (about 100ft) back and came to a small grassy meadow with an interpretative sign.  Apparently, this is all that remains of the Ford’s homestead.  BC Parks has installed a pit toilet just outside the little meadow.

Here we found the path to the promised beach; a lovely small beach of mixed sand and gravel.

We sat on some large driftwood logs and ate our lunch.  The day was cloudy, and just a cooling breezes flowed across the water.  A young family landed their small motorboat on the beach and brought out their picnic.  We chatted with them and watched as they swam and kibitzed around in the water.  It was a bit cool for Trish and I, so we opted to stay dry and just enjoy the beach, the lunch and the company.

For the return trip back to your vehicle, you can retrace your footsteps or take the Creekside trail, which ends at the suspension bridge.

All in all, Fossli Provincial Park was well-worth the ½ day or so we spent there, and we both highly recommend this park for an outing.