A Little Visit To Shawnigan Lake

A Hospitable Welcome; The Shores and An Islet; Island Charms; A Garden Orchard

Victoria Daily Times

July 4, 1925.

BY ROBERT GONNELL

The traveler by the E. & N. has scarcely taken his eyes off the calm depths of the fiord known as Finlayson Arm when to his left he perceives the glint of water through the trees, where, in a long valley in the hills, lies Shawnigan lake. The distance is only about four miles, so short that it might well answer to Tennyson’s description in the “Morte d’Arthur”:

“On one side lay the ocean, and on oneLay a great water;”

were it not that in the poet’s mind the more likely picture was that of a cut-off lagoon. The train, meanwhile, is skirting the steep shoulder of Mount Wood with its open forest.

At a way-side station stalwart Sikhs are all wood transporter lumber and a glassy little knot of small rope be-turbined as their fathers watch the train go by. At last we reach Cliffside where we find on the platform the genial postmaster and storekeeper of the scattered hamlet. My son and I are just asking the nearest way to the lake when a fellow-traveler invites us to follow him, and we begin the descent to the lake-shore. Through the garden of the store and so along the road for a short distance, then into the woods past little cottages scattered here and there the path goes.

The low bridges and “corduroys” and the plants now that in Winter this woodland, now dry and warm in the Summer sunshine, then the be plentifully supplied with water. At length we reach our guides Summer home and the beauty of the lake bursts upon us. To the North it extends its narrow length through its wider vale while on each side but especially to the West and North high and picturesque hills bound the horizon. Mr. Armstrong who has so kindly escorted us to the shore goes to the greatest hospitality put us his boat and canoe at our disposal and in their latter we glide out on the placid waters.

THE SHORES OF SHAWNIGAN

The lake is four and three quarters miles long and at its widest dawn three quarters of a mile. The Northern half is situated in the rocks of the Vancouver volcanic, but the Southern reveals all along its margin the dark and glistening Wark diorites. Like Sooke Lake and Finlayson Arm it has been formed by the glacial deepening of an older valley, but while Sooke Lake drains south into Sooke Basin by way of Sooke River, Shawnigan Lake finds its outlet at the North end whence by Shawnigan Creek it drains into Saanich Inlet at Mill Bay.

Perhaps the most striking thing about the Lake, at least once, such it was to me, is the border of Sweet Gale which surrounds it at the level of its Summer water. It is distinguishable from the interspersed willow by its blue-green foliage so far as the eye is concerned and in the general view. But in addition, the leaves, toothed at the apex, are very aromatic, slightly suggestive of camphor, a quality which is due to the glandular dots with which they are plentifully furnished. The flowers appear in Spring before the leaves, so that at the time of our visit there were all the ripened catkins.

The little nutlets they contain are also richly aromatic. Sweet Gale, botanically Myrica Gale, is also known in Great Britain as Bog Myrtle. Candleberry Myrtle, and Sweet Willow. The second of these names reminds us that in the old days good housewives in districts where it was obtainable used its scented wax in the making of candles. Its abundant presence along the shores wherever we passed seems a link with the lakes and locks of the old land where it grows plentifully in the mountainous regions.

AN ISLAND PARADISE

We went ashore on a small island for lunch and spent an hour or so along its shores and in its wooded glades.  I was surprised to find one of those interesting fern relatives, the Moonworts, prowling among the rocks just above the water. Botrychium silaifollum, the Silaus-leaved Grape-fern, owes its specific name to its leaves which resemble—I know not to what degree—those of a British umbelliferous plant, Silaus or Pepper-saxifrage. The thickish sterile leaves are triangular in shape, while the fertile ones bear the round sporangia or spore-clusters. Among the rushes and reeds grows the scarlet paint-brush, a very narrow-leaved variety of Castilleia miniata, and the pale blue violet, Viola palustris.

Within under the trees, I first found Pyrola picta, with creamy white blossoms, and next, occupying a beautiful open glade, Pyrola asarifolia, with pale pink flowers tinged with crimson. Plentifully abundant everywhere was the small Pyrola secunda, with its white flowers growing along one side of the stem. These pyrolas are commonly called "Wintergreens," from their evergreen habit. The "wintergreen" of flavoring renown is another plant of the same Heath family, Gaultheria procumbens, of the same genus therefore as our Salal. The pyrolas are very plentiful in our Northern latitudes, as, for example, in the popular "bluffs" of the prairies. The pink and white species which grow there are more sweetly scented than ours, but in beauty and grace, nothing could well exceed the three species on the islet, especially picta and asarifolia.

Islands have a peculiar charm about them—perhaps I should rather say "islets," for the charm lessens with increasing size. In one way, it is perhaps due to the fact that our personality expands there as it does in our "own house and among our household gods." Our geographical isolation by water gives a sense of separateness and aloofness, which is at least flattering to our self-esteem, and that is a species of enjoyment which, in some way or other, we all are apt to find pleasure in.

There is something too in the quiet of the islet, which is accentuated by the movement of the surrounding water. W. B. Yeats, in that charming lyric, The Lake Isle of Innisfree, expresses it with the felicity of the poet:

"Always night and dayI hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements grey,I hear it in the deep heart's core."

On these small islands, there is nearly always some peculiarity of plant or animal life to interest the student of natural history, so that in his small way, he may enjoy himself as Wallace did on the grand scale in the islands of the Malay Archipelago. On the shore, we found the remains of a crayfish, one of the long-tailed crustaceans allied to the lobster and inhabiting fresh water. There were portions of the tail fins or swimmerets and of the pincer-claws. As is the case with other water-animals, the shell of the crayfish is much slighter proportionately than that of its marine relatives.

The hours sped by, and in due course, we returned the canoe to its kindly owner...