This place is near the Southern tip of Gabriola Island on the exposed, Strait of Georgia side. On the chart there is a steep drop to around 200 feet. I was checking an online map of Gabriola Island and it showed a public access trail down to the shore at the end of Dragon's Lane so I came here on Sept. 25, 2007. There was a yellow-painted stone marker marking the start of the trail. The trail was a narrow, uneven, winding path through the woods down to a small bay. This trail was probably about the length of the trail to the popular McKenzie Bight entry point. Then there was a somewhat awkward climb down some sandstone rocks to the beach. There were some stairs nearby, but they were obviously private property so I stayed off them. I swam out to the entrance of the bay, descended and swam straight out and a bit to the right. The bottom was a slope of boulders (some of them were the size of buses) with areas of sand here and there. Visibility was only around 10 feet in the shallows, but cleared to around 40 feet below 50 feet deep. I didn't feel any current, but who knows. Some of these boulders were covered with crimson anemones. Other boulders were covered with feather stars. There were quillback, copper and juvenile yelloweye rockfish swimming around. There were even quite a few Ogden Point-sized lingcod. The sandy areas had sea pens and carpets of brittle stars writhing around. I swam deeper and there seemed to be less boulders and more sand. There were boot sponges with juvenile rockfish peeking out and feather stars clinging to the outside. I went down to 120 feet deep, but there seemed to be less life down there. I found that the best area (with the most anemones, feather stars and fish) was around 60-80 feet deep. This would be perfect wolfeel habitat, but I didn't see any (I didn't see any tiger rockfish either so I didn't look too hard for wolfeels). I continued to swim out to the right (East). There were more piles of boulders and dramatic sandstone walls shooting up to the surface. These walls didn't have as much life on them as the boulders. One wall met a sandy area around 50 feet deep. There was a huge undercut crack at it's base that was around 3 feet high and went in farther than I could see with my light (around 20 feet). Outside there was a pile of large Puget Sound king crab shells from some monster octopus that must have been living inside. I swam back to my entry point past more huge boulders with zoanthids, cup corals, tunicate colonies, etc. growing on them. The bay had shallow reefs in the middle covered with rock weed, purple seastars and strange branching tunicate colonies that looked like finger sponges from a distance. Back on shore I had a look at the weird sandstone formations. Across the bay there was the "Dragon's Keep" resort. I'm not sure if it's still in business (the gate was closed, no one was around and on the internet it's listed for sale). I couldn't help thinking that this would make the perfect budget dive resort. There are several tiny camping-like cabins on the shore (plus the main building) that would be great for dive club getaways. There's the excellent shore diving on the island, Gabriola Passage and Dodd Narrows are just around the corner and it's close to the diving hub of Nanaimo. If any one wants to lend me $2 million to buy the place I'll give you a 10% discount on airfills.
