Hiking Lighthouse Park in West Vancouver
Contents
Lighthouse Park Hike Information
Difficulty: Easy
Distance: 5.80Km
Elevation Gain: 270m
Highest Elevation: 115m
Average Gradient: 9.31%
Effort/Reward Ratio: Low / Moderate
Time Needed:
– Slow: 2 – 3 Hours
– Moderate: 1.5 – 2 Hours
– Fast: 1 – 1.5 Hours
Dogs Permitted?: Yes
Season: Year-Round
4×4 / High Clearance Required? No
Scrambling / Exposure: None
Lighthouse Park Trail
Trailhead Coordinates: 49°20’15.3″N 123°15’45.8″W
Lighthouse Park Overview
Lighthouse Park is a beautiful park in West Vancouver, featuring some of the largest Douglas Fir trees in Greater Vancouver, and offering stunning shoreline viewpoints throughout much of the trail. The park is biologically rich and is a fine example of old growth coastal forest close to the city.
There are many trails within the park to a variety of viewpoints, giving the option for a very easy stroll or a longer hike throughout the entire park. The route described here covers the perimeter of the park and hits all of the main viewpoints along the way.
Due to its close proximity to Vancouver, the great views, the relative ease of the hike and the fact this is both family and pet friendly, Lighthouse Park is a very popular spot and can get very busy on a sunny weekend. The parking lot is quite small and fills up quickly, with the lot being closed when full and little option in the way of overflow parking, so an early start is recommended.
Lighthouse Park is open year-round and makes for a great gloomy day option. It’s also a fantastic spot to visit for sunset, with mostly westerly views and plenty of spots to sit and enjoy the views from the shore. The park is a popular bird watching spot, and if you’re lucky you may even see some marine wildlife such as sea otters or seals, especially during low tide.
Due to the vast amount of trails within the park, it’s quite easy to take a wrong turn and as such an offline map is strongly recommended if you intend to stay on a specific trail.
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Is Lighthouse Park worthwhile?
Lighthouse Park is one of those simple trails near the city with excellent views. The effort / reward of this hike is very good, with great views throughout and not a huge amount of effort to obtain them. I particularly like Lighthouse Park when I am not feeling too adventurous but I just want to get outside, or even on one of those (many) rainy days when you don’t want to go too far but you do want to get outside.
How difficult is the hike to Lighthouse Park?
Overall the hike is pretty straightforward with constantly undulating terrain that descends towards the shore before climbing away from it throughout the hike. Rarely will the terrain be completely flat, but rarely will it ever be exceedingly steep either. At under 10% average gradient it’s daily simple stuff.
Technically the hike is pretty easy too. The trail is typical BC forest, made up of loose rocks, dirt and tree roots throughout. Some of the viewpoints along the way will require some careful footing as you ascend and descend rocky cliffs but it’s pretty simple stuff.
Lighthouse Park Route Information
The parking lot for this hike begins at the very southern tip of Beacon Lane in West Vancouver. You’ll probably want a GPS to get there as the roads are a bit of a labyrinth and you’ll probably feel like you’re going the wrong way once you leave the highway, but it’s there!
There are several different trailheads from the parking lot, with the main one at the southern tip leading directly to the lighthouse. We’ll be taking a less obvious one to the left of this, climbing up and away from the main trail into the forest. I strongly recommend having an offline map here as following the trail initially was challenging without it.
You’ll immediately join the Salal Loop trail, going left on the first junction. After 500m or so you’ll hit another junction where you will want to take the Arbutus Trail. There’s not a lot to note on these trails, it’s typical BC forest. After following the Arbutus Trail for a few hundred meters you should hit another junction with a signpost for the Valley of the Giants Trail, which you’ll want to take.
The trail now becomes really scenic, passing some massive old-growth Douglas Fir trees and passing through some lovely forest scenery, all while descending towards the shoreline. Thankfully the maze of trails now eases off and the route is more straightforward. After following the Valley of the Giants Trail for around 500m you’ll reach the shore, with a small trail leading to the first view of the day, Eagle Point. You get some really nice views of the city and English Bay from here as well as a little inlet on the other side.
After resting up, head back to the trail and now you’ll want to join back on the Arbutus Trail, going left. The trail now climbs away from the shoreline again and back into the forest. After around 50m on the Arbutus Trail you should reach a junction with the Valley Trail, where you’ll want to go left. The trail now hugs the shoreline and in no time you’ll see a trail leading to Starboat Cove, with a little beach covered in deadfall that is a popular spot for dogs to frolic in the water. You’ll also get some more nice views of the city from here.
Heading back up to the Valley Trail, the trail continues along and soon reaches Arbutus Knoll, which is another little viewpoint that might be worth a brief stop, otherwise continue along until you see signage for East Beach. Follow the East Beach trail, passing by some cabins and restrooms, until you reach the beach. The East Beach provides some of the better views of the lighthouse, but you are required to climb up some of the slippery rocks on the beach in order to see it, so take care.
Once you’ve finished up at East Beach, head back to the cabins you just walked past. You can cut in front of these and join a paved trail past some of the lighthouse administration buildings to a gate overlooking the lighthouse itself. It’s a relatively decent view but nothing more than a quick photo stop, so head back to join the trail and continue along it. In a couple of hundred meters you should reach the Shore Pine Trail, which covers the west side of the park.
The Shore Pine Trail is much narrower than some of the other trails but does offer some nice views as well. You will soon pass a sign to the West Beach Trail, which I didn’t check out as I figured I’d had enough from the East Beach, so I continued along until the viewpoint. This was a nice little spot offering some views to the west of Bowen Island and the ferries coming and going.
Back on the trail you’ll continue descending and soon reach Shore Pine Point, which again offers some really nice views of the rocky shore and Bowen Island. Continuing along the Shore Pine Trail the next 500m or so will be a bit of a grind with little to see other than the usual forestry, but soon you’ll reach another junction to the Juniper Loop. This is an optional loop and you can skip it if you feel like you’ve seen enough, but I did check it out as I wanted to see what was at Juniper Point. Well, you guessed it, it was much of the same shoreline views and in all honesty you wouldn’t miss anything by skipping it, so it’s your call.
Either way, the Juniper Loop ends back where it starts, so whether you took it or not, the last part of the trail is just a couple of hundred meters back to the parking lot, thus completing the hike.
When should I hike Lighthouse Park?
As noted Lighthouse Park is a year-round hiking option that is always quite popular, but none more so than during the summer. I tend to prefer to go on a gloomy day when the park is less busy but the views are still great, but if you’re going on a sunny weekend I do encourage you to go early to ensure a parking spot.
Top Tip
If you don’t want to do the entire hike as described here, it’s very easy to shorten it. The highlights for me were Eagle Point, Starboat Cove and East Beach, so you can probably skip the entire west side of the park if you want to keep it shorter, instead returning through the middle of the park via the Valley Trail.
I strongly recommend an offline map as there are many trails within the park and it’d frankly be impossible to follow this entire route without one.
