Roy L Hales/ Cortes Currents - “A lot of the places people want to go and visit are either down a beach access or they are a park. We've got large areas of unfragmented forest in Ha'thayim or Von Dominic Park. Mansons Landing Provincial Park is a really bio diverse lagoon full of marine life. Those parks together make up quite a big parcel of land that's set aside for conservation and for nature to thrive. There's no development pressure, that's really important. We have those permanent resources protected, and obviously there's a lot of really interesting ecosystems in them too,” explained Helen Hall, Executive Director of the Friends of Cortes Island (FOCI).

“It's just a wonderful collection of fantastic places that we've got protected on this island, and I think we should celebrate that. The parks are there, not just for nature, but they're also there for people to enjoy and learn about nature. They're very popular on Cortes.”

FOCI’s involvement began about 20 years ago, before there was a Strathcona Regional District (SRD). Hall is not sure whether FOCI approached the Comox-Stathcona Regional District, or they approached FOCI, but the the society has been maintaining Kw'as Park since then. Their next maintenance contract was for Carrington Bay Park. We were managing those two parks for a number of years. Then, shortly after the SRD was created in 2008, they were entrusted with the beach accesses to:

Gnat Beach access, in Squirrel Cove,

Moon Park, near Hollyhock Beach.

Seascape Park, at the end of Seascape Road

Hayes Park, at the end of Hayes Road.

Three or four years ago, FOCI took on Siskin Forest Park and Trails, the and the new Whales Rest Park (which everyone used to know as the park down by the ferry) and Whaletown Commons.

“So we've got quite a big collection. The only one of the regional parks that we are not looking after is Hanks Beach. Friends of Cortes actually maintains, I think it's nine regional parks and trails,” said Hall.

They also look after Mansons Landing Provincial Park, Smelt Bay Provincial Park and Háthayim Marine Park [a.k.a. Von Donop Marine Park]

in the north of the island.

“We've had a maintenance contract with the SRD for quite a number of years now, where Ryan Harvey and Alex Bernier will go out every month. They walk the trails, clear any trees have fallen, pick up any garbage that's been dropped and basically keep the parks in really good shape. They're doing that under contract with us and that's a year round job. so they're out walking every trail every month, which is quite phenomenal really. There's a lot of trails,” said Hall.

“The other thing we've done is partnered with BC Parks at down at Manson's Spit/Manson’s Lagoon, and we've done a number of things down there. We're trying to get the Broom out of the spit, particularly out of what's called the coastal sand ecosystem, which is that sort of grassy looking ecosystem that grows along the beach. It is actually quite rare. We tried to get the broom out of that so that the plants there can flourish. We've been doing that with volunteers. We installed a new sign, which was celebrating all the marine life in the lagoon and informing people how to take care of it and not tread on things and not to take things away. So we had a little education piece there as well.”