Locarno Beach

This guide to Locarno Beach begins in 1949, when archaeologist Charles Borden knelt in the sand and pulled out a tiny antler carving of a human face, the first clue to a village site so distinctive it gave its name to an entire ancient culture along this coast. The narration covers the shell midden layered beneath the sand, left by generations of Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh families, and the beach's own name, borrowed in 1925 from a Swiss peace treaty. Look closely at the sand as you walk; some of these tiny carvings turned up just beneath the surface here.