West Ballenas Island is the site of a historic lighthouse in the Ballenas-Winchelsea Archipelago, and part of a proposed marine park in the Gulf Islands, about 15 miles (24 km) northwest of Nanaimo and 7 miles (11 km) northeast of Parksville, British Columbia. The island is about 100 acres (40 ha) and the proposed marine park covers 12,108 acres (4,900 ha). The island’s geology is generally described as part of the Wrangellia terrane, which forms the westernmost portion of the Canadian Cordillera and much of Vancouver Island. The terrane comprises Paleozoic to Jurassic volcanic, sedimentary and plutonic rocks. West Ballenas Island consists of limestone from the Quatsino Formation; based on fusulinids—extinct single-celled organisms with calcareous shells—the rock is dated to the Middle Pennsylvanian period of the Paleozoic era, about 310 million years ago. The last Cordilleran ice sheet covered British Columbia, streaming down fjords and valleys in the coastal mountains. Some lobes at the ice sheet’s western margin extended to the continental shelf edge, where they calved into deep water. Glaciers from the southern Coast Mountains and Vancouver Island Ranges coalesced over the Strait of Georgia to form a great outlet glacier that flowed far into Puget Lowland in Washington State, shaping much of the present‑day landscape.

Evidence suggests that the earliest humans arrived in the Strait of Georgia soon after the glaciers receded enough to allow movement from the interior. The Marpole Midden site at the mouth of the Fraser River was inhabited at least 4,000 years ago, and the present-day Coast Salish First Nations are descended from its earliest inhabitants. The Ballenas Islands are the traditional lands of the Nanoose First Nation—also known as the Snaw-naw-as First Nation. The first European contact with Coast Salish peoples occurred in 1791 during Francisco de Eliza’s exploration of the Strait of Georgia. During that voyage, Ballenas Island was named by José María Narváez, who, aboard the schooner Santa Saturnina, sighted a pod of whales surrounding the islands. In 1808, Simon Fraser of the North West Company entered Coast Salish territories via the Fraser Canyon. Fort Vancouver was established in 1824, Fort Victoria in 1843, and a Hudson’s Bay Company trading post was built in Nanaimo in 1852. In 1898, Captain Morris Smythe, on HMS Egeria, recommended establishing a light and fog alarm on the Ballenas Islands to serve the growing number of vessels using the Inside Passage.

Funds for a light signal were approved in 1900, and a construction crew was sent to East Ballenas Island to build a square, pyramidal wooden tower, about 100 feet (30 m) tall and topped by a lantern. In 1907, various shipping interests petitioned for an improved signal. Construction then began on a foghorn at the northern tip of West Ballenas Island and, by the end of the following year, a wood-frame dwelling and a rectangular structure housing a diaphone horn—supplied by the Canadian Fog Signal Company of Toronto—were completed. In 1912, the lighthouse on the eastern island was removed and reassembled near the foghorn. That same year, a boathouse, slip and windlass were added, and the following year a new dwelling was completed along with the installation of a duplicate fog alarm. The lighthouse was de-staffed and automated in 1996. A long-term conservation goal for the islands has been the creation of a marine park within the Mount Arrowsmith Biosphere Reserve. The Ballenas‑Winchelsea Archipelago is home to abundant bird populations, rare plants, threatened species and diverse marine life. The area proposed for a marine park already includes a provincial park on Gerald Island, a private park on South Winchelsea Island, a regional park on Vancouver Island and four small community parks along the Vancouver Island waterfront associated with the Lantzville community. Read more here and here. Explore more of West Ballenas Island and Gulf Islands here: