Welcome to Wells Gray Country
Land of Fire, Ice and Torrent: The Landscapes of Wells Gray
Most of Wells Gray Country lies within the boundary of Wells Gray Provincial Park, a vast wilderness preserving pristine forests, high mountains, roaring rivers, big lakes, and the plants and wildlife which live among them.In 1913, surveyor Robert Lee was the first European to set eyes on the astounding 145m cascade of the Murtle River, which was later to be named Helmcken Falls. This feature alone was enough to lead to the establishment of the Wells Gray Park in 1939, named after Arthur Wellesley Gray, a prominent provincial politician of the time. The founders had the foresight to include the entire headwaters of the Clearwater River’s watershed, thereby preserving the great majority of a complete ecological unit. This was further improved in the mid-1990s, when the Park’s boundary was extended to south along the Clearwater Valley.
A Vast Wilderness
Wells Gray covers an area of some 5,400km², and is the fourth-largest of BC’s provincial parks. It is nearly the same size as Banff National Park, and larger than Yoho, Kootenay, Glacier, Mt Revelstoke and Pacific Rim National Parks all put together. With the adjoining Cariboo Mountain and Bowron Lakes Parks further to the north, a wilderness of more than 8,000km² (3,000 sq miles) is preserved - larger than many countries!The Park protects a great diversity of landscapes and associated eco-systems, having evolved through a fascinating series of natural events. The following sections will cover just a little of this detail...
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| Photo: Adventure Wells Gray |
Mountain High
High mountains occupy much of the Park, stretching up to nearly 3,000m (10,000ft). Many are capped by large icefields, which feed glacial streams and the lakes below. These highlands form the south-eastern limit of the Cariboo Mountains, a range raised by immense pressures in the earth’s crust as the Pacific oceanic tectonic plate was consumed beneath the western seaboard of North America.This also resulted in intense volcanic activity. Large volumes of basaltic lava erupted throughout the area, continuing until only a few hundred years ago. This left a legacy of cones, vents, and lava-beds, most are still easily recognizable throughout the area today. Indeed, scientific opinion is still not convinced that the volcanic activity is entirely extinct, but we’re not expecting an eruption anytime soon…
Much of this volcanic activity took place during glacial periods. When the lava erupted, the ice above melted rapidly - sometimes explosively. The interaction between lava and the water released in this way gave rise to many rare geological features. In warmer interglacial times, the erupting lava rapidly filled the deep glacial valleys with soft, unstable rock, which was rapidly eroded by river-action.
Valley Deep
Wells Gray’s glaciers and snowfields are a tiny remnant of the vast ice-sheets which pulsed into the area from the north during a series of glacial events lasting until about 10,000 years ago. The ice gouged major valleys from the rock as it advanced, exploiting deep structural weaknesses in the Earth's crust to form the basins for the big lakes we see today: Hobson and Azure, which feed Clearwater Lake, and Murtle in the east.These lakes provide one of the major attractions for those who visit Wells Gray, offering the best canoe-camping country in Canada, with Murtle Lake being the largest canoe only lake in North America.
These lakes also act as giant filtration tanks, allowing the glacial sediment carried out of the mountains to settle, making the Clearwater River (into which they all eventually drain) so, well - clear.
Photo: Matt Jennings
Waterfalls
When layers of soft, unstable lava filled the glacial valleys, the energetic rivers quickly eroded it to give the deep, narrow gorges we see now throughout the Park. Where they have encountered harder rock, waterfalls and rapids developed to give Wells Gray its nickname of the ‘Waterfall Park’.In the more accessible southern part of the Park and immediately around its borders, there are over twenty major waterfalls. Many of these are a short stroll from the parking-lot; others are an hour or two to walk, whilst some are a fairly major expedition which may take a day to complete. If you'd like to see a map of waterfalls in the area, click here.
For more information email info@wellsgray.ca