How One Resident’s Final Wish Became North Saanich’s Newest Public Space
Some parks are built. Wolf Orchard Park was given. Gerhard Furstenau, known to his friends and neighbours as Gerry, purchased a half-acre lot on West Saanich Road in 1955 for $700, after arriving from Saskatchewan where he and his brothers, tired of hard winters, had heard of a distant, magical place called Vancouver Island and vowed to travel there once summer came. He stayed for nearly 70 years.
The Wolf Orchard property, located at 11004 West Saanich Road, was donated to the District upon Gerry’s passing on February 6, 2023. A condition of the donation was for the property to become a public park bearing the name Wolf Orchard, in honour of his brother Wolfgang. It is the kind of arrangement that says something about the person who made it, and about the community he chose to spend his life in. Gerry resided on the property for nearly 70 years and had developed a working relationship with nearby Deep Cove Elementary School, allowing students to garden on his property, a program the school has continued and wishes to maintain. The concept for the park was developed in collaboration with the estate, family members, executors, and school administration, with priorities identified as improving traffic and pedestrian safety along Clayton Road, provision of parking, and a walking path. Work began in the summer of 2025, removing an old structure, prepping and paving the parking lot, improving access, and improving drainage and pedestrian safety on nearby Clayton Road. The District held a grand opening on May 13, 2026, inviting the whole Saanich Peninsula community to celebrate.
Wolf Orchard Park is a small park in the way that North Saanich is a small district: modest in scale, significant in what it represents. The District of North Saanich is already home to 29 local parks and 34 kilometres of trails, and each one carries its own story. This one carries a particularly human one: a man from the prairies who found his place on the north peninsula, tended his land for seven decades, and left it to the people around him. That is not a policy outcome. It is a community.
Sources:
https://www.connectnorthsaanich.ca/wolf-orchard-park
https://www.saanichnews.com/news/north-saanich-senior-celebrates-95th-birthday-288858
