Strathcona can be explored for trip planning through three nature themes: mountain wilderness, lakes and island nature. Part of Strathcona Provincial Park is in Electoral Area A of the Strathcona Regional District. Carrington Bay Park is on Cortes Island in Area B; Area B is also part of the Strathcona Regional District.

Mountain Wilderness and Winter Activities

Strathcona Provincial Park is considered the oldest provincial park in British Columbia and a rugged mountain wilderness in the heart of Vancouver Island. The park offers opportunities for backcountry skiing and snowboarding, as well as cross-country skiing and snowshoeing trails. This provides a choice of different ways to enjoy winter outdoors: backcountry skiing and snowboarding on the one hand, and cross-country skiing and snowshoeing on trails on the other. If you want to make a mountain winter the focus, you can plan around the activity you prefer.

Paddling on the Lakes

Canoeing and kayaking are possible on Buttle Lake and Upper Campbell Lake in Strathcona Provincial Park. These two named lakes make paddling a distinct focus alongside the park’s winter activities. You can first decide whether to base your trip more on winter trails and skiing or snowboarding, or on canoeing and kayaking on the lakes. This turns the choice between mountain and water activities into a concrete decision based on your travel interests.

Park Landscapes in Electoral Area A

Electoral Area A includes 13 provincial parks, four of which are marine parks. The total and the subset answer different questions for orientation: 13 parks provide a regional overview, while the four marine parks highlight a particular park category. This makes it possible to distinguish the mountain setting of Strathcona Provincial Park from the broader park landscape in Area A. This is helpful if you first want to choose between a specific landscape focus and a regional selection of parks.

Cortes Island: Coastal Park and Mountain Biking

Carrington Bay Park on Cortes Island brings another type of landscape into your trip planning. The park includes a tidal lagoon, shoreline areas and coastal zones, streams, second-growth forest, and sensitive cliff ecosystems. The lagoon and shoreline are connected to the water; streams, forest and cliff ecosystems add other natural features to the landscape. This makes Carrington Bay Park a distinct coastal focus alongside the mountain theme of the provincial park. There are also opportunities for mountain biking on Cortes Island, adding a specific cycling activity to the park landscape options. More broadly, British Columbia’s parks extend beyond Strathcona’s mountain, lake and coastal themes: the provincial parks also include sandy beaches and impressive forests. BC Parks also manages campgrounds, day-use areas and thousands of kilometres of hiking trails across the province.

Discover more destinations: Whaletown, Mansons Landing, Sayward, Heriot Bay, Refuge Cove, Minstrel Island, Kyuquot, Comox-Strathcona G

For the broader travel overview: British Columbia.