Hello all,
I recently purchased myself A great little 2dr wrangler, and my wife and I would love to go trailing sometime. Neither one of us are from the Island, so it is hard to know where to head and would love to meet new people and hit the trails together! :)
Hello and welcome to the Island!
I hate to break it to you but Victoria and the Capital Regional District in general is the worst place on the island for off roading.
The CRD has everything zipped up tight and there are serious consequences for having motor vehicles in the water shed area particularly.
To top things off, due to a crooked land deal in the 80's, 85% of what was once crown land on the island is now privately owned forest lands that we can't just freely access anymore. Timberwest and Island Timberlands owns most of the bush on this end of the island and they're not always very accommodating of the needs of us recreational users who prefer 4 wheels over a pair of hiking boots when it comes to exploring the wilderness. It's not quite like it is on the mainland over here.
That being said though, there are still lots of places you can go, so I hope that little disclaimer there didn't bum you out too much.
The further north/west you go up the Island, the more back country exploration options you have, so be prepared for longer day trips and overnight camps and some extra gas cans if you really want to start exploring what's out there. I moved back here about 20 year ago and have been wheeling off and on for the last 8 years and have barely even tapped in to anything above the 49th parallel. I doubt I will ever come close to seeing it all but I intend to get out there and enjoy it more. We have some of the most stunning scenery in BC if not all of Canada here on the island and there's no shortage of places within driving range that you can explore.
Heading out west on Hwy 14 you will need to drive past Sooke before you start to have access to anywhere substantial but even driving the Marine Circle Route is a nice day trip. Heading up north of the Malahat on Hwy1 there are some places you can still explore via the old Renfrew Road in Shawnigan Lake but more and more gates seem to keep showing up locked every time I try to go somewhere I used to be able to years before. Further up island near Nanaimo and over near Port Alberni, things start to really spread out and open up but it can be tricky if you're not familiar with the area. I have heard of some pretty good wheeling up in Courtenay as well but that's such a long drive that I rarely ever go up there and don't know anybody there to guide me. Cowichan Lake is also a good place to find and explore trails within reasonable distance of civilization. Another one of my favorite places to go is out to the Mt. Prevost/Mt Sicker area on the north-west side of Duncan. There's some old mines and remnants of other industrial activities up there and a quite a few good trails of varying difficulty for being a relatively small and closed in area. It helps to go with someone who knows the area though since there are a few places you should probably avoid as some of the tempting looking trails are just dead ends or trapped out and there are still a few dangerous mine remnants.
One of the places I often recommend for a "nice day" off the beaten path is to the Bear Creek Reservoir in Jordon River.
It makes a good first offroad trip with a new vehicle or a light shakedown because it's not remore or difficult and it's in an area where you are likely to find help if you do run into trouble since there's no cell service out there.
I made a Wikilok trail map and posted it in this thread if you need directions: https://www.vioffroad.com/forum/routes-destinations/jordon-river-bear-cr...
It's an hour drive out of town but it's not a long or difficult trail once you're there and the views are nice along the way. I posted pics and a few video clips of our trip earlier this year. If you check out my wikilok link you will see I also uploaded another fairly easy loop trail in the same area. It's not very technical but again it helps you get the feel for the ground and the vehicle. This area isn't as nice as it used to be so I always find myself going past it now to the other side of the river.
Now that I'm fairly confident in the abilities and limitations of my new mod's I may attempt to do the Tansky Trail on the other side of the river on the Timberline block in my Tracker and upload that as well but the last time I tried it in my old unmodified Tracker running 27" street tires, I almost got it stuck and had to turn back so this time I'm coming in with a 2.5" lift and 29" AT's. It's technically an ATV trail, so it does get pretty narrow in places. It's wide enough for a Suzuki but if you're still worried about your paint job and don't want to earn your island pinstripes yet, then it's probably not the first place you'd want to go in your Wrangler.
Oliphant Lake is a neat little day adventure but that's one you should do with one of the locals who knows the area. It's technically one of those areas you're not supposed to be in but everyone kinda does it anyway and as long as everyone respects the leave no trace rules and doesn't cause trouble, enforcement is limited to a cat and mouse game of trying to block the one entrance that most people use while the locals keep going around it or clearing it. On any given day it may not be easy to get in the usual way but then it could be open for weeks with no problem most of the time. My ex GF's parents lived in Mill Bay and we went for countless day trip picnics up in there over the years. I love the old overgrown road back there that looks like it belongs in a Walking Dead episode. It feels kinda creepy driving on it, like a post-apocalyptic country road. LOL!
If you haven't already, join the 4WDA groups/pages on Facebook. Friend up with some locals and do some runs.
https://www.facebook.com/groups/4wdabc/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/4wdabcvanisle/
There are a lot of wheelers on the island and we love to meet up and go trail running together despite the access issues we face as a fact of life here. The locals know the secret sneaky ways to get in and out of places but nobody likes to talk about access publicly due to fears of areas we enjoy being destroyed due to abuse from the general public menaces that eventually end up finding their way in to ruin things. I know of more than a few places I would never disclose the route or destination location of simply because I know there are those who would not respect them and the extra attention and traffic would be a sure death sentence.
I am planning to do some off roading this Sunday with my GF, just not sure where yet. I do want to try Tansky again but it's been a few years since I've seen the condition of it and I don't have a winch so I'm a bit apprehensive going solo. I do also want to scout out some ground and see if the chantrelles are out yet so even cruising FSR's looking for good mushroom picking ground is still a better day for me than sitting at home. The dry spell kept me out of the bush for most of the summer and the itch to get out in the dirt is now impossible to ignore. I have a lot of 4x'ing and camping to catch up on so every day I have the chance to get out this fall, I'm going for it! ;-)
Cheers & see you on the trails...
Thank you so much for all that great information. I have been up to Bear Creek, and explored a little bit of it (based on your thread that I stumbled across, great info too). I have started joining more groups and noticed the same problem with the logging companies blocking every road they can.
Even though I just bought my jeep, I already earned the BC pinstriping. I have one of my friends that is going to join me with his wrangler this weekend, and we are just trying to figure out where to head to have ourselves a little fun, even if we have to go further North.
Well there is a Sooke run on Saturday by one of the 4WDABC VI members, not sure what the planned route/destination is though.
https://www.facebook.com/events/1502576766502044/?acontext=%7B%22source%...
I can't go because I have to work but if you see a white 2nd gen Tracker with a rotopax on the back farting around in the bush somewhere between Sooke and Port Renfrew on Sunday, that's probably me. ;-)
I'm still not sure exactly where I'm going to go Sunday but now I'm by myself since the GF has to work so I'll probably be scoping out different elevations and exposures for any signs of mushrooms. The season is about 4 weeks late this year after being about 3 weeks late the couple of years before that which were a year or two late compared to the late 90's, when you could still pick pines commercially down here. Climate change and deforestation have killed off most of my best patches. This year is a bit of a last ditch effort for me to find some productive ground worth the drive..
I hear that. My wife recently went to Wilderness Committee after we did some camping for a few weeks. We are fairly new to the island and this place is absolutely beautiful, but damn the log the shit out of this place. Back in NS we don't see trees like this and it is a real shame they log so hard on this island. Shame I work Saturday kind of.
One of the primary reasons the logging companies don't allow access is they are logging the shit out of the island, and mainly to send raw logs overseas. They'd rather not have anyone paying too close attention. The dribs and drabs of access they do allow is simply to keep the appearances of being good neighbours, and appease a few people who might otherwise raise a stink. If the population of Vancouver Island ever really "woke up" to what a rotten deal the Dunsmuir land grants were for everyone, things might change.
I agree with the poster who said Vancouver Island is one of the few places where you are made to feel like a criminal for wanting to enjoy a drive through the back country. It stinks.
So you read my rant post eh... ;-)