Campbell Valley Regional Park

Green, the colour of the forest, calms and relaxes. It also has a healing effect and is said to relieve depression and anxiety.

I had the most amazing day today - in the most awesome and sublime green environment of the Campbell Valley Regional Park, about a half hour's drive from my place. I'd heard of this place but hadn't yet visited it . After today's outing, I'll be going back to do more exploring.

Even the sign for the place was green. After parking the car in what I hoped would continue to be a shady spot, we found the entrance to the trail that we'd decided to do today. It's one of the shorter trails and with my bad back acting up lately, we thought that would be the best one to try. So off we went along the Little River Loop Trail, a 2.3 km easy walk that would take us through areas that made me think of Louisianna bayous, the California redwood forest, and alpine meadows full of blue lupine, white daisies, buttercups, and wild roses.

This place is HUGE with both a north and south entrance. In some areas horses are allowed and there is an off-leash area for dogs, too. Our walk was very quiet and we didn't meet anyone else until we were almost back at our starting point. It took about 45 minutes to do the 2.3 km but I was always stopping to take photos. Everywhere I looked I saw art. There is nothing more beautiful than nature and I just kept snapping away until D#2 began to tease me. But I didn't care. I thought of all of my blogging buddies and buddettes and how you'd enjoy seeing the photos. So here are just some of the many shots I got today. I hope you enjoy them and are tempted even more to come visit my little corner of Beautiful British Columbia.

The beginning of the trail.

Walking beneath a canopy of trees.

Giant ferns! Bigger than me!

This gives you an idea of the size of most of the trees!

D#2 walking ahead of me on the trail.

There were a lot of trees like this with moss hanging from them.

A little forest glade that we came upon.

I saw several enormous tree stumps; the one of the left is obviously a red cedar and I think the other one is, too. Just older. I don't think I could have managed to climb on top of them because they were that big. However, I could have crawled under the one on the right but I hesitated because of what might have been living there.

Periodically, we came upon these little wooden bridges that I guess go over the Little River. However, right now the river must be dry because there was no sign of it.

When I looked up.......waaaaaay up (like the Friendly Giant used to say)....this is what I saw.

When we were walking through the forested part of the trail, we came upon lots of buttercups and these wild flowers at the left. I'm not sure what they are, but they were pretty.

Eventually, we came out of the forest and discovered we were in an area that looked exactly like an alpine meadow. For as far as we could see, it was absolutely full of blue lupine, white daisies, and dark pink wild roses. I must say I thought it was stunning.

Then again, we found ourselves again in a forested area with thick canopies and wild raspberries just ripening on the vines.

Do you remember that creepy scene in "The Wizard of Oz" when the trees came alive? Well, this tree reminded me of those trees so I just had to take a photo. I almost felt like saying "Hi" to it.

What an awesome afternoon in a location so near to my own home! This is a place where I know I'll return over and over again, especially in the autumn when the deciduous trees will turn brilliant colours and the sun will cast long shadows through the park's statuesque trees. For now, I'll leave you with this shot of the sun trying to get through the high canopy to reach the floor below. I hope you've enjoyed your virtual tour along the Little River Loop Trail at Campbell Valley Regional Park and you're calm and relaxed from all the green.