A short ferry journey from the city of Vancouver, Vancouver Island is a not so hidden gem of Canada. Disembarking at the port of Nanaimo I suddenly realised that this was a little world apart from the country itself.
The first thing that struck me was the near wild west looking settlements on the side of the minimal roads that there were. One of these was a small village with its own goat farm, but these goats didn't live in a field but on the roof of the main (massive) shop .
We needed to get to Tofino a small port town on the other side of the island and it soon became apparent that there was one singular road (Pacific Rim Highway) that led there and that took us through the most beautiful awe inspiring scenery i have ever seen. Cathedral Grove was the perfect name for one of the parks we drove through: Trees taller than most buildings from back home , mountains further than the eye could see.
Arriving in Tofino i was expecting a bustling port town with trade and many shops and a lot of tourists, it turned out to be exactly the opposite. It was calm, hardly any noise apart from a few local first nations having a few beers on the sea front.
A few sea planes were going in and out of the port throughout the late evening, the clear First Nation influence on the town was evident. Wooden buildings and multiple totem poles dotted around the place as well as many First Nation art galleries all which gave the place even more beauty.
Day 2: An early morning start to go and do some bear watching around the peninsula. Our guide Matt took us out in a smallish yellow boat, around the islands. We did indeed spot some bears but these turned out not to be the main attraction for me, more the incredible vast uninhabited scenery.
Day 3: Early morning again, headed to Chesterman beach , a beautiful scary "tsunami risk zone". This was a prime spot to set up the camera to take some daytime long exposures of the sea hitting the typical black jagged rocks of the pacific north-west. Yet this led to an unfortunate event. I fell into a tide pool with all my kit and my camera and phone became unusable, so the next trip with our guide Matt to a natural hot springs was hardly documented.
At the hot springs I became good friends with a dog ... or what i thought was a dog. Turned out to be a wild dog/wolf but it was a good boy: sadly was not allowed to take it back with me as it "would be logistically challenging" to get it back to Britain.
The photo below perfectly sums up the Tofino area: big, calm and scarily beautiful.
