Bowen Island

Bowen sits in Howe Sound twenty minutes from Horseshoe Bay, and from 1920 the Union Steamship Company ran it as a resort: cottages, a dance hall and picnic grounds served by steamers bringing Vancouver crowds for the day, a trade that ran until the 1950s. Some of the cottages survive around Snug Cove as shops and a museum. The island is about fifty square kilometres, mostly forest, with Killarney Lake a flat hour's loop from the ferry and Mount Gardner a longer climb of around seven hundred and fifty metres. Most visitors walk off the ferry rather than bring a car, which is the sensible approach.

What you actually see

• Snug Cove - the ferry village with surviving Union Steamship cottages.
• Killarney Lake - a flat loop walk within an hour of the dock.
• Mount Gardner - a forested climb to a view over Howe Sound.
• The resort history - a museum on the steamship-era day-trip trade.

When to go

May to September; the island is quiet in winter with reduced services. Summer weekend ferries fill with vehicles, so walking on is faster. The last sailing back is early, so check it.

Honest expectations

Vehicle queues at Horseshoe Bay can mean missed sailings in summer. Services on the island are concentrated at Snug Cove and thin elsewhere. The last ferry is earlier than people expect.

Nearby

Horseshoe Bay is the mainland terminal; the Sea to Sky Highway runs north from there.