Strathcona Provincial Park occupies the mountainous heart of Vancouver Island, stretching between the communities of Gold River to the west and Campbell River to the east. Within its boundaries rise the island's highest peaks: the Golden Hinde at 2,195 meters, Elkhorn Mountain at 2,166, Mount Colonel Foster at 2,129, and Mount Albert Edward at 2,093. Della Falls, at 440 meters one of the tallest waterfalls in Canada, plunges down a basalt cliff face in the park's southern reaches. The geology is dominated by the Karmutsen Formation -- 6,500 meters of ancient pillow basalts and volcanic breccias that form the oldest and thickest rock unit on Vancouver Island. Glaciers cling to the high ridges. Buttle Lake, the park's most accessible body of water, draws swimmers, canoeists, and anglers to its shores.

This land is the traditional territory of the Mowachaht and Muchalaht peoples. Commander John Buttle first explored the area for Europeans in the 1860s, and in the decades that followed, the region attracted surveyors, prospectors, and the attention of politicians. Reverend William Bolton explored the interior in 1894 and 1896, and his accounts helped spark interest in creating a protected area. BC Premier Richard McBride set aside a park reserve in June 1910, and his Minister of Lands, Price Ellison, led an expedition that included the first ascent of Crown Mountain in July of that year. The park was officially created in 1911, named for Donald Alexander Smith, 1st Baron Strathcona and Mount Royal, a railway pioneer and philanthropist who never set foot in it.

From the beginning, Strathcona Park was treated as much as a resource reserve as a wilderness sanctuary. Mineral claims were staked within its boundaries as early as 1911. In 1939, mining and logging were formally permitted, and the Myra Falls Mine opened in 1959, producing zinc, lead, copper, silver, and gold from a section now designated Strathcona-Westmin Provincial Park -- a Class B park intended to revert to the main park when mining ceases. In the mid-1950s, 600 hectares of lakeshore forest around Buttle Lake were logged to make way for the Strathcona Dam, one of three hydroelectric dams powering the John Hart Generating Station on the Campbell River. When water levels drop, the stumps of that logged forest reappear along the shoreline -- a periodic reminder of what was given up.

Despite its complicated history, Strathcona Park remains an extraordinary landscape. Its subalpine ecosystems support western redcedar, Douglas fir, and mountain hemlock. Roosevelt elk, Vancouver Island marmots -- one of the world's most endangered mammals -- Vancouver Island wolves, black bears, and cougars roam its valleys and ridges. The Clayoquot Sound Biosphere Reserve, designated by UNESCO in 2000, includes three watersheds in the park's western reaches. Hikers can access an extensive trail network from Buttle Lake and Forbidden Plateau. The park offers campgrounds, backcountry routes, cross-country and downhill skiing, and fishing for cutthroat, rainbow, and Dolly Varden trout. Campfires are banned except in provided fire pits -- a rule that says something about how seriously the park now takes its own preservation.