Byrne Creek Ravine Park

There are many trails within Byrne Creek Ravine Park, both paved and dirt trails.

Round Trip: 4 km

Time allowed: 1 hour walking with some stops

Good all year

Family Hike (Dogs are permitted off leash on dirt trail part)

History: Originally known as Woolard's Brook, this waterway once flowed eastward through cow pastures and bog. Interference with its peaceful course began in 1893, when a man named Peter Byrne rechannelled the creek to supply a newly dug ditch running through the bog to the Fraser River—an arrangement that allowed the Gilley brothers and other logging companies to float their timber down the ditch to the river and thence to the sawmills in New Westminster.

In the 1980s the watercourse was redirected yet again to accommodate road alignment, and today Byrne Creek runs through Riverway golf course on its journey to the Fraser. The ravine through which this walk wanders has been protected as part of Ron McLean Park and is part of a larger program of saving neighbourhood ravines from development or use as illegal garbage dumps.

Although close to Skytrain, flanked by residential streets on the west and apartment towers on the northeast, the ravine remains a belt of wilderness that offers some surprising discoveries to nature lovers.

Highlights: Forest and creek; Ron McLean Park; shrubs, berries; songbirds. Terrain: Ups and downs. Forest trail, some steps, park path and road.

The cache is located up the slope away from the sensitive stream close to the large tree. Close to the tree you will see some large rocks covered by the invasive Ivy that is not native of the area which if gone unchecked can result in damages to the local natural habitat of the area.