Exploring Scenic Canyon and Finishing the Kelowna Parks Challenge

Kelowna Parks Challenge – Trip #47

This week, as part of the Kelowna Parks Challenge, I saw three parks in the Mission Creek Canyon, including the beautiful and amazing Scenic Canyon Regional Park. These three parks were the last left on my Official List, which means I have successfully completed my challenge!

Read on for my impressions and reflections of these final three parks.

The Trip

This week’s parks are all located in the large and amazing canyon formed by Mission Creek as it makes its way across the Benches of southeast Kelowna. Starting around the site of Joe Rich to the east, the creek and its canyon make their way west until they are joined by KLO Creek, which flows north from its own beautiful canyon in the mountains to the south. After that, the combined waters swing around a large bend to head north, where the canyon ends in southeast Rutland and the creek turns west again, heading across its old floodplain towards Okanagan Lake.

Geology

The entire landscape, but especially the area within Scenic Canyon Regional Park, is one of the most fascinating spots to explore geology in all of British Columbia, let alone the Okanagan Valley. Nowhere else is it so easy to look out and see the evidence of the forces that have shaped the area. One of those forces was water, which rolled the cobbles that can be seen even high on the sides of the canyon and which eroded the deep ravines of the creeks themselves; another force was volcanism, which laid the foundational structures that glaciers and the lakes and rivers that came after them worked upon.

It was volcanism that gave us what is perhaps the canyon’s most celebrated feature, Layer Cake Mountain. Nearly unique in the world, this beautiful geological phenomenon was formed, incredibly, from the top down, as a large bubble of lava slowly cooled forty million years ago. As the top “skin” of the bubble cooled and hardened, it would periodically slip and slide on the softer lava underneath, creating a series of layers.

Ecology

As an additional treat, exploring these parks in September gave me a chance to observe the annual kokanee salmon run in Mission Creek. Just like last year, when I explored Mission Creek Regional Park, further downstream, I was able to look in the water and see many bright red salmon struggling against the current. The salmon run is a wonderful way to experience the changing seasons in the wild, and I am so glad so many opportunities to view it have been preserved in our local parks.

Hollywood Road South and Teasdale Road Property

This is an as yet undeveloped park. It has no official features that I can see, though it does have an old road running through part of it.

I’m not sure about the history of this site, but I would not be surprised to learn it used to have one or more buildings on it. It feels more like a reclaimed empty lot than an undeveloped scrap of native ecosystem that has been preserved for conservation purposes. Which is not to say native plants and animals aren’t making use of it. From the piles of trash I saw, rough-living humans are making use of it, too.

Washrooms and Drinking Fountains: There is no drinking fountain in this park. There is no washroom in this park.

Dog Rules: Dogs are not allowed in this park, since there are no official trails.

Mission Creek Bike Skills Park

This is a unique and special park in Kelowna’s parks system. Unlike any other park in town, this one is dedicated to riding BMX and mountain bikes.

Surrounded by a sturdy fence, this park comprises a series of jumps and riding tracks that are labeled according to their difficulty. It is a great place for both kids and adults to practice their skills.

Washrooms and Drinking Fountains: There is no drinking fountain in this park. There is a portable washroom in this park, by the parking lot and park entrance.

Dog Rules: Dogs are allowed in this park but they must be on-leash and stay on official trails.

Scenic Canyon Regional Park

This is another great regional park in a system full of them. For the naturalist, this park features an incredible variety of geological features and ecosystems for its size.

Its trail system is dominated by the last ten kilometres of the Mission Creek Greenway, though the final three, east of KLO Creek, are currently closed due to washouts. This park has parking lots at both its north end, off Hollywood Road, and its south end, off Field Road.

Washrooms and Drinking Fountains: There is no drinking fountain in this park. There are two washrooms in this park, a portable washroom at the southern parking lot and a washroom with running water at the northern parking lot.

Dog Rules: Dogs are allowed in this park but they must be on-leash and stay on official trails.

Reflections

I was very excited to get to explore the canyon for a few reasons. First of all, because it is an amazing and significant geological feature in its own right; secondly, because I thoroughly enjoyed exploring the canyons on KLO Creek and Bellevue Creek, and expected more of the same; and thirdly, because I had already seen it from afar, most notably from the amazing viewpoint at Bella Vista Park on Kirschner Mountain.

I had a great trip and will definitely walk there again. The walk from the southern entrance down to the rock ovens is relatively gentle at a 5% grade, and the walk from the north entrance to Smoothing Stones bridge is flat nearly the whole way, so I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend those walks to anyone. Of course, the rest of the trail is great, too. I particularly enjoyed the high point of the trail, where I walked through a scented grove of sagebrush and juniper to arrive at the wide terrace where the Kelowna Canyon Suspension Bridge used to be. There I found the best view of Layer Cake Mountain and the Pinnacle.

The bike skills park was difficult to enjoy without a bike, but it was fun to watch people riding and practicing as I walked by. Meanwhile, the Hollywood and Teasdale Property felt like a historical mystery, which was a good deal more interesting than I expected it to be.

Finishing the Challenge

Of course, in addition to the excitement of visiting three more parks for the first time, this week also featured the thrill of finishing the Kelowna Parks Challenge! Although it may seem like I fudged it, taking two months off for Covid lockdown and not walking every metre of trail in every park, ultimately it was a personal challenge, and I personally feel like I accomplished my goals.

During the course of this challenge, I visited every park in Kelowna, and that meant visiting every neighbourhood in Kelowna. It was never about just being able to say I had been to these places, but to gain the benefit of actually experiencing them. My ultimate goal was to become familiar with all of the parts of my new home town, to be able to understand on a more intimate level when other residents speak or write about their own Kelowna experiences. I will never have the experience of a native resident who has grown up here and has significant personal memories tied to this place, but I think I gave myself a significant jump start in terms of creating personal memories of my own.

Even if I never visit some of this city’s parks again, I will never forget having stood in them at least once. I will never forget seeing salmon in Misson Creek or deer on Knox Mountain. I will definitely never forget the views from the tops of the local hills, or the sense of accomplishment I got from climbing them.

Thank You

If you have been following my challenge, I thank you. I hope I have shared something that interested or delighted you. More than that I hope I have inspired you to visit some of your local parks. I have never failed to find it to be true that physically going to a place is a much more holistically moving experience than reading about that place or looking at pictures of it. I have taken a lot of pictures as part of this project, and I have always tried to show you those that best captured my impressions of the places I explored, but I can honestly say that none of my pictures fully captured the feeling of being in those places.

Conclusions

With the addition of this week’s three parks, I have now seen all of the two hundred and three parks on my Official List in three-hundred and sixty-four days, which means I saw 100% of the parks in 99.7% of the year. I am done!

That doesn’t mean I am done exploring, however. Over the course of this challenge, I learned about all of the areas of Kelowna, which means I learned about a lot of interesting places that haven’t been incorporated into parks, such as the Thompson Flats or Mount Baldy. In addition, there are parks that didn’t make my official list, such as most of the linear parks and the new Black Mountain Regional Park. There were also parks I didn’t see the entirety of, such as Tower Ridge Park and Stephens Coyote Ridge Regional Park. All of which is to say that I have lots of ideas about what to explore next.

I can’t say at this point whether I will start a new challenge, but I can say that I am not done sharing my adventures with you. There probably won’t be a new post and video every week, but new content will come. I sincerely hope you will stick along for the journey.