The Wildwood Mountain bike loop near Courtenay is a fun, varied ride

By Keith and Heather Nicol

There are maps at the trail head to help you navigate

     We must have driven by the Wildwood Forest Recreation Trails sign over 150 times (mostly enroute to Mt Washington to ski) before we actually stopped by to see what it had to offer. The Wildwood Forest is shaped abit like a “L” with the main access at Piercy Road. There is not much official parking there but you can park along the road (coordinates 49 41.746 N, 125 03.673 W) and on our first visit we offloaded our mountain bikes to try a 13.5 km loop. It is useful to either print a map at this link:  https://www.comoxvalleyrd.ca/parks-recreation/comox-valley-parks-trails/wildwood-interpretive-forest  or pick up a map at the trail head like we did. Our route is actually one that is presented on the map and follows the Burns Connector to the Bob Webb trail where the route then follows the One Spot trail. We followed this trail to Piercy Road and then biked the pavement back 3 km to our car. Allow about 75 minutes to do the route depending on how fast you cycle. 

The trail is generally firm gravel or dirt which makes for easy riding

Much of this route is on smooth firm gravel or dirt trails so a standard mountain bike with a front shock is a good choice although we also saw a fellow on a road bike doing it as well.We subsequently took my brother and his wife who were visiting from Victoria on this route and they used hybrid bikes with no front shock and they were fine so the route can be ridden with a variety of bikes.  We even saw a fellow with a motorized wheelchair fitted with off road tires which was great to see.  Expect to see horses and walkers on the trail so be aware of other users. The route has a good variety of landscapes from classic west coast forest with lush ferns to fields with horses and open pasture. There is not much up and down so can be ridden by a wide range of ages and stages. Also be aware of the standard wild animal cautions since black bear and cougars travel through this area.

We eve saw a fellow with a motorized wheel chair with off road tires doing the trail