A six-knot tidal stream runs through the entrance, and in June 2023 two unoccupied houses on Narrows Road burned together.
Where Gunboat Bay sits, and the other places we attend
around Pender Harbour. Every name on the map is a link.
The innermost basin of Pender Harbour
Gunboat Bay is the easternmost arm of Pender Harbour, immediately below Highway 101 at the head of the harbour. BC Geographical Names adopted the name on 2 December 1948, on map sheet 92F/9, as a bay rather than a settlement. The official community plan for Egmont and Pender Harbour does not include it in the list of distinct neighbourhood areas; it is a feature inside the Madeira Park and Kleindale settlement area, and the plan mentions it once, for a bridge that has never been built.
Road access comes off Highway 101 and off Garden Bay Road. Narrows Road runs along the shore. Routing on 12 September 2026 measured 9.57 kilometres and 13 minutes from the north shore to the Madeira Park centre, roughly three times the straight-line distance, because the road has to go around the basin.
The entrance is passable only near high water
The cruising description of Pender Harbour published by Ahoy British Columbia states that Gunboat Bay is entered at the east end of the harbour through a narrow channel that is impassable except at mid and high water. It records tidal currents reaching 6 knots, slack at high water, depths of 6 to 9 metres, and holding ground that is good almost everywhere. The same entry describes the bay as secluded inside except at the east end, where the highway is near and there are homes, and the head of the bay as tidal flats suitable for kayaking.
For an owner with a boat or a float here, those sentences set the timetable. A vessel inside the basin can only be moved on part of a tide. If a line parts or a float shifts on an ebb, the next chance to reach it may be hours away, and the harbour's marinas, fuel dock and rescue facilities are all outside the narrows, at Madeira Park, Hospital Bay and Garden Bay.
The plan asks for a bridge that has never been built
Among the objectives in Bylaw 708 is a multi-use pedestrian and bicycle bridge link across Gunboat Bay from Madeira Park to Garden Bay. The distance across the water is about a kilometre. By road it is 14.58 kilometres. The two commercial centres of Pender Harbour face each other across this basin and are twenty minutes apart by car.
On 16 June 2023 two empty houses burned on Narrows Road
The call came in at about 10:40 in the morning. Two residential houses on Narrows Road were alight, and both were unoccupied at the time. Nineteen Pender Harbour firefighters attended with engines from Madeira Park and Garden Bay, and two personnel came from Egmont. Crews stayed on scene until about six in the evening. Nobody was injured. The cause was not known at the time of the report, and no follow-up was published.
A neighbour, Dilys Williams, described the roof of one house collapsing, and said of the response:
We've got huge support here right now ... The local people have just done an amazing job.
Dilys Williams, neighbour, reported 16 June 2023
Fire Chief Jim Cameron used the incident to tell residents to "just be very aware of our conditions right now". Two houses side by side, mid-morning, nobody inside either one to smell smoke, and the fire had moved between the structures before the first engine arrived. The five Pender Harbour engines carry 3,300 US gallons between them and the department lists no tender. The bay's own water is salt and tidal.
Neither piped system names this shore
The regional district's published service area for the South Pender Harbour system covers Madeira Park, Francis Peninsula and Kleindale. The North Pender system's own background paper names Garden Bay, Irvines Landing, Daniel Point and Sakinaw Ridge. Neither document lists Gunboat Bay. Owners here should know which side of that line their own parcel falls on: it decides whether a winter failure is a metered leak or a well pump nobody hears running.
On 20 December 2024 a stabbing was reported in the 12800 block of the highway, near Cecil Hill Road and Narrows Road.
What a check at Gunboat Bay covers
Narrows Road itself and the driveway off it, including washouts and fallen limbs
Doors, windows and outbuildings on both the road side and the water side of the house
Smoke and heat detectors, and any sign of heat, smoke or scorching around appliances and flues
Heat holding at temperature, or the plumbing drained and the supply valve shut
The well pump and pressure tank, or the service connection if the parcel is on a regional district main
Float, ramp, dock lines and any vessel tied inside the basin, timed to a workable tide
The septic tank lid and the field, with attention to wet ground after heavy rain
Trees leaning toward the roof or the overhead service line after a southeast blow
Photographs and a written note of each item, sent the day of the visit
Household policies generally require an unoccupied dwelling to be inspected on a set cycle during the heating season by a competent person, often at intervals no longer than four consecutive days, or the water shut off and the pipes emptied. Wordings differ from one insurer to the next, so confirm what your own policy asks for.
What it costs
A scheduled check at Gunboat Bay is
$55 a visit, plus
$10 travel. The travel charge is the same
everywhere between Gibsons and Egmont. There is no minimum term and no joining fee.
See the full price list.
Where these facts come from
Every figure, date and quotation on this page was taken from one of these. They are
listed so you can read them yourself.
