Secret Beaches of Southern Vancouver Island by Theo Dombrowski

Author:Theo Dombrowski [Dombrowski, Theo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-1-926936-23-9
Publisher: Heritage House
Published: 2011-04-01T04:00:00+00:00

47

Seabold Road Parkette

A giant wooden staircase high in the trees of a wooded bank down to a large expanse of low-tide sand

Location, signs and parking There are several approaches you can take through the tangle of roads in this congested suburb, but it is perhaps easiest to drive down Groveland Drive from Dickinson Road and thence Seabold. When you get onto Seabold Road, simply follow it to the end. A sign identifies the spot as Seabold Rotary Park and provides information about the volunteers who developed the park. Some maps identify it, oddly, as a “parkette,” while Lewis Road “park,” close by, is much smaller and less developed. Parking is a real problem. The road is not particularly wide and has a curb, and so no shoulder. In addition, many driveways crowd the area. Visitors will simply have to park as considerately as they can along the road.

Path The “path” is really something of a minor engineering masterpiece. Before you come to the spot where you can descend to the beach, however, you will pass (or, possibly, hesitate at) a pretty and manicured area with four picnic tables and a playground, embellished with a pleasant little stand of arbutus and fir. At the end of the area, you will come to a magnificent flight of suspended wooden stairs descending in a sequence of rest stops, 179 steps to the beach. In fact, the descent to the beach is part of the pleasure of this spot, since you will almost have the feeling that you are high among the big trees.

Beach Where the path reaches the shore, the beach is not at its best: a little stream enters the beach at this point, and a large gravel area fans out about 30 m in all directions. Beyond this circle of gravel, most will feel that this is a beach to rival the best sandy beaches of this whole section of coast—if, that is, you prize vast, long flats of sand stretching hundreds of metres out to a low-tide line. Patches of eelgrass and large tidal pools give variety and colour to the wide beach. Occasional big boulders protrude up from the sand.

Suitability for children Sand-loving children will have a wonderful time here, at least at low or intermediate tides. There is vast space to galumph, warm tidal pools to splash in and so on. You might want to bring flip-flops or beach shoes for traversing the gravel patch, however. You may also find your child is the sort who finds the eelgrass beds creepy rather than fun. There are a few other flies in the ointment. The beach has little to offer the sand-loving child at high tide—and particularly because the upper beach is in deep shadow for the entire day except the early morning. In addition, of course, 179 steps is a large number, especially when you are going up those steps rather than down. Even with the rest areas and platforms, the staircase can lessen the pleasure of bringing children of certain dispositions to this beach.

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