Quatsino Provincial Park, Provincial park on Quatsino Sound, northern Vancouver Island, Canada
Quatsino Provincial Park covers 654 hectares on Quatsino Sound, about 50 kilometres west of Port Hardy on northern Vancouver Island. It protects old-growth trees, small lakes, Koprino Harbour and the Koprino River estuary. The park is undeveloped and primarily reached by boat or rough logging roads.
The area was officially designated a provincial park in 1995 to protect fish nurseries and waterfowl habitats along the Pacific coast. This protection status recognized the ecological value of this coastal zone.
Quatsino Provincial Park lies within the traditional territory of the Kwakwaka'wakw, whose villages and resource sites line Quatsino Sound. The park's name comes from Quatsino, a Kwakwaka'wakw village on the sound. Visitors today share the waters with kayakers following a route long used by coastal peoples.
Access is by rough logging roads or by boat; the park is about 50 kilometres west of Port Hardy and has no developed facilities. It is primarily a marine-access park on a popular kayaking route, so most visitors arrive by water and camp in the backcountry.
Quatsino Provincial Park is one of the few places where you can camp in the backcountry and launch a kayak from the same shoreline. The park has no developed facilities, so everything you need must be carried in and out by boat or along rough logging roads.
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