Welcome to White Rock, British Columbia, Canada
Your White Rock (White Rock, Surrey, South Surrey, Langley)
area contact is Jim and Joyce Williams (REMAX ridgemeadows realty.) Please refer to the "White Rock, Surrey, South Surrey, Langley" section to the right for
the phone number and email address to contact Jim or Joyce directly about the REMAX MLS real estate homes for sale including residential houses,
apartments, condos, duplexes, acreages and farms not listed for sale here.
White Rock summary
With a population of 19,735, White Rock is located in the southwest corner of the Lower Mainland of British Columbia, Canada, forty-five kilometers from
Vancouver and is flanked on the south by the Canada/US border and Blaine, Washington. It is a seaside community clustered around an eight kilometer sandy
beach and the warm shallow waters of Semiahmoo Bay. It is famous for its 1,500 ft. long pier, its 2.5km long beach promenade, being the home of the Walrus,
and of course the large white rock.
The city of Surrey, British Columbia surrounds White Rock on four sides, with the dividing lines between the two municipalities set at 136th Street (Bergstrom Street)
to the West, 16th Avenue (North Bluff Road) to the North, 160th Street (State Road) to the East, and 8th Avenue to the south. Even though the area to the south from
160th Street westward to where 8th meets the water is Semiahmoo First Nations Reserve land, it lies within the bounds of the City of Surrey. From the point where
8th Avenue meets tidewater, the boundary between the two then heads south to the US border within Semiahmoo Bay, and the remainder of the southern border is
(technically) the US border.
Because of its moderate, almost Mediterranean climate (on a good day), White Rock is a preferred place to live. The average summer temperature is twenty-three
degrees Celsius while the average winter temperature is six degrees Celsius. White Rock is often referred to as either 'the gem' or 'one of the gems' of the
Lower Mainland, in local real estate advertising, particularly if you have money. Pilots accustomed to flying around the area often refer to it as 'the hole in
the sky', referring to the fact that White Rock is often bright and sunny, while the rest of the Lower Mainland peers through rain and cloud.
White Rock is named for a distinctive large white boulder found on its beach near the promenade. A glacial erratic that migrated south during the last glaciation.
The 486-ton granite boulder was kept white by shellfish-eating seabirds, whose guano covered the rock, so much so that sailors in the 19th century used it as a
beacon. However, it now remains white through frequent applications of white paint by the city parks department, as it has been a popular graffiti target for over
thirty years.
The large, white rock figures prominently in narratives of the local Coast Salish native peoples. One legend holds that the Transformers, emissaries of the Sagalie
Tyee, the Creator, once passed. Another legend holds that the white rock marks the landing spot of a stone that was hurled across the Strait of Georgia by a young
Indian chief. It was said that he and his bride would move from Vancouver Island to wherever the rock landed to make a home together. It was their descendants who
became the Semiahmoo first nation. ('Semiahmoo' is the Coast Salish word for 'half-moon', describing the shape of the bay.)
Text & photo credits
The text contained in 'White Rock Summary' above is courtesy of Wikipedia.com.
The article ('White Rock Summary') is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License
(See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.)
It uses material from the Wikipedia article "White Rock, British Columbia".
The White Rock header image on this page is courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. Reference:
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