False Narrows is a waterway 10 to 30 feet (3-9 m) deep, navigable only by small boats with local knowledge, and about 1.3 miles (2 km) long, separating Gabriola Island to the north from Mudge Island to the south, approximately 37 miles (60 km) northwest of Sidney and 8 miles (13 km) southeast of Nanaimo, British Columbia. The name dates to British Admiralty Charts from 1859. Mudge Island was named by Captain George H. Richards after William F. Mudge, an officer on HMS Plumper. The southeastern tip of Gabriola Island was reputedly named Punta de Gaviola in 1791 by José María Narváez, a Spanish explorer on the schooner Santa Saturnina; over time the name was corrupted to “Gabriola” and applied to the whole island. The bedrock of the islands consists of different layers within the Nanaimo Group that developed during the Late Cretaceous. These rock formations are mostly sandstone, siltstone, and mudstone formed by sediment deposition in an elongated trough-shaped basin. Sedimentation was probably triggered by the collision and subsequent accretion of the Wrangellia Terrane onto the edge of North America. The collision would have created significant uplift and mountain-building, resulting in rapid erosion and high sedimentation. The sediments were derived largely from volcanic, igneous intrusive, and metamorphic rocks of the mainland, with minor contributions from Vancouver Island rocks. The Nanaimo Group includes conglomerate, sandstone, mudstone, and shale.

Gabriola Island is part of the traditional territory of the Snunéymux First Nations. Before Europeans arrived, several thousand people lived on Gabriola Island in several villages, the largest of which was situated on False Narrows and known as Senewelets, a Halkomelem word meaning “go inside narrows via the back part”. Archaeological investigations at this site indicate it was inhabited for at least 2,000 years by prehistoric Marpole and historic Coast Salish peoples who depended mostly on food from the sea and coastal fringe. Europeans began settling on Gabriola Island shortly after coal was discovered in the Nanaimo area in 1852. Coal miners, ex-gold miners, and pre-emptors started farms to supply Nanaimo’s growing population. By 1874, 17 settlers were working the land on Gabriola; ten years later the number had doubled. In 1887 a sandstone quarry opened at Descanso Bay on the western end of the island to supply dimension stone for major buildings in Victoria and Vancouver. Later in the 20th century the quarry produced mill stones and pulp stones for local paper production. In 1911 a brickyard was built at the western end of False Narrows. The bricks were made from crushed shale mixed with water to make clay, then pressed before being fired in a kiln. After the second world war a shipyard operated at Silva Bay on the eastern end of the island and became the major employer until the 1970s. The quarry operated until 1936 and the brickyard closed in the early 1950s.

About 3 miles (5 km) of the southern shore of Gabriola Island west of False Narrows is used as temporary moorage for log rafts waiting to be processed at the Harmac pulp mill near Nanaimo. The mill produces wood pulp from Douglas fir, western hemlock, balsam fir, and western red cedar, which is sold to markets in Asia, Europe, North America, and Latin America. The mill is situated on a deep-water port to facilitate handling logs delivered in rafts and other raw materials such as wood fiber, as well as exporting pulp. Since the early 1900s log towing has been a common means of transporting bulk timber from remote areas of British Columbia to lumber and pulp mills. As this practice evolved and tugboats became larger and more powerful, log rafts also grew larger and more expensive if lost or broken up in stormy weather. In the 1920s loggers developed various rafting configurations to minimize loss. Davis rafts are up to 250 feet (76 m) long, 60 feet (18 m) wide, and 30 feet (9 m) deep, and a raft can contain nearly a million board feet of timber. Timber rafts reached enormous proportions: sometimes thousands of logs were contained in rafts up to 2,000 feet (600 m) long, 160 feet (50 m) wide, and stacked over 6 feet (2 m) high. Read more here and here. Explore more of False Narrows and Gabriola Island here: