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All old timers in Sooke have stories of SOOKE
MOUNTAIN PARK—many have photographic support for the tales they spin.
Some can remember the area (now called a provincial park), when it was
just a playground outside the protection of the government. Actually,
protection is not the right word, as it has not really been protected—more
like mismanaged—by the civil servants charged with the responsibilities
of land control.
 Sooke
Mountain Park came into existence June 6, 1928. It is suspected that at
that time the Province thought it was getting three lakes and the watershed
for those lakes. If one looks at the present map and repositions it just
slightly up as a surveyor might do, one can see that the enclosed area
is notched and angled to cover all those three lakes. However, the sad
truth is that today, by using modern GPS equipment, we can see that none
of the lakes are in the park.
How this came to be is speculation at best
as no one who was there for the official survey is still alive to defend
their actions, and the present civil minions quickly shy away from any
discussion on the subject. One interesting explanation I’ve heard is that
when the logs were taken off the area, some of the land got out of the
provincial holdings, leaking, one supposes, into private hands just as
air leaks from an ignored spare tire. Out of sight, out of mind. There
is some evidence that Sooke Mountain Park was somehow connected to some
shady dealings around the province getting title to what is now called
Portland Island, which was confiscated from Canadians of Japanese descent
who were then shipped to the prairies for “safe keeping”.
Suffice to say, today Sooke Mountain Park
is a shadow of what everyone using it thinks they are using. Most people
do not know where the borders are, and some think that when they travel
up Harbourview road a ways onto the rough gravelly part, they are in the
Park. Truth is, they have to travel through lots of the private holdings
before they enter the Park and they leave it soon afterwards.
The history of the park includes a time when
it was considered by the Canadian Pacific Railway Company as a destination
wilderness holiday area. It was frequented by eastern city dwellers, who
were sold a travel package including rail to Vancouver, ferry to Victoria,
wagon to the lodge at the end of Shields Lake, where they spent a few
days or weeks relishing the “wilderness”. This story was told to me by
a lady who also connected the Four Mile, Six Mile and 17-Mile pub to the
adventure. She said that these and others like them were used as stopping
places after a stay in the Empress Hotel ... 17 Mile being the jumping
off place for the Park.
The lodge went through a succession of owners
both private and public, ending its days as a Boys and Girls club destination,
when it burned in the ’60s. The big cement blocks you find scattered around
there today are all that remain of the lodge at Shields Lake ... unless
you find someone with family photos of the place.
Some say the Park is Old Growth Forest, but anyone visiting
today will not find this to be true. While they may find a very few Old
trees, most of the Park is covered by 2nd or 3rd growth trees with little
or no evidence of reforestation. Still, there are old spectacular trees
on the summits of the four mountains from which the Park takes it name.
Empress, for Queen Victoria (some say the name derives from the Empress
hotel), Manuel Quimper, named for the engineer on the first white Spanish
ship to arrive in Sooke Basin, Mount Shepherd and Ragged Mountain complete
the circle. The names for these last two are even more obscure as to origin.
There is a story that Shepherd moniker came from a fiasco between two
sheep herders over a woman. The body of one of the shepherds was apparently
found on this mountain.
Whatever the folklore, the Park has all the
usual problems associated with any recreational area. The roads leading
into the Park all traverse private property, giving the province the excuse
that the area is landlocked therefore unusable for recreation. They are
unable or unwilling to secure the trails and gazette any roads to the
Park. Even with the long history of hiking, hunting, fishing, and extensive
off-road use by both rubberized vehicles and equestrians, the Park remains
a poor cousin to the many other provincial parks in the system.
Sometime in the 1950s an enterprising logger
devised a plan to get the trees off the Park, in exchange for paving the
road now known as Harbourview all the way to the base of Empress Mountain.
Included in the plan were trees from the adjacent properties. The deal
included labour provided by the residents of Wilkinson Road Crowbar Hotel,
and materials from the Gagliardi Hardware Store nicknamed Flyin’ Phil’s
Place ... or so the story goes.
There are really four lakes associated with
Sooke Mountain Park. Shields is the largest and the deepest...it used
to have the lodge mentioned earlier. Crabapple Lake used to have a cabin
on the side next to the dock, which burned in the early ’70s. This was
a private cabin open to whoever could take pride and care in its use.
Grass Lake (called Grassey) completes the three at the top side, while
Peden Lake, named for Victorian Olympian Torchy Peden, is much closer
to the Pot Holes Provincial Park. It is sometimes considered to be in
Sooke Mountain Park, partly because there is no vehicle access from Pot
Holes to Peden Lake.
All these lakes have been stocked at various
times and harbour good eating rainbow trout among other fishes. Although
a licence is needed to fish here, little else is required, but if you
go it helps to carry a personal flotation device and lotsa flys.
The features of interest on the mountains
include a long burned ranger lookout on Empress, which also has geodesic
survey marks where they measure the 1 1/8 inches of movement per year
of the Island Plate towards the city of Vancouver. The dishes are for
forest company communications. Shepherd also has a ranger fire watch tower,
unused for many years, except, for hikers shelter and message center (graffiti)
... but has spectacular views. Manuel Quimper is my personal favorite
as it takes much longer to climb and features wildlife instead of evidence
of the wild life (parties).
Ragged Mountain could soon support a dish
farm ... but at present has some spectacular views of Sooke, Victoria,
and the Olympic Peninsula of Washington State, USA.
In recent times there have been gates and
threats of closure hanging over the trails leading into Sooke Mountain
Park. There is presently a closure at Leechtown making a round trip through
the park unavailable since the River Road exit off Harrison trail (also
known as Highway 117) has also been gated, bermed and ditched.
Over the years, the Park has been made inaccessible
to 4X4s on several occasions, with the battle to keep it open being taken
up by users of all descriptions, leading to the clearing of the obstruction
eventually, but with many hours spent at meetings and in negotiations
to have the area designated as a 4X4 and off-road destination. To date,
May 1999 this effort seems to have fallen on the desks of non-understanding
civil servants.
Some successes have been recorded, with gates
being removed and promises given by politicians and civil servants that
Sooke Mountain Park will remain. One needs a healthy sense of humour and
an understanding that nothing is permanent in any land use issue to survive
the struggle to keep this 101 year old park available for its traditional
use.
Off-roaders must enter this struggle with
vigour.
Copyright © 1999 Ron Low
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