Taking the Island by Storm

Well, not exactly, although there was a bit of a storm blowing in when I was heading across to the island. The day started off with tearful farewells, as I was leaving Whistler with Amelia. Although I was returning, this was Amelia's farewell to the mountains before a train trip to, ultimately, Toronto.

But I was only heading to Vancouver Island, on the search for trees. The itinerary for the first day involved travelling Whistler to Vancouver, Vancouver to Horseshoe Bay, ferry to Nanaimo, and then bus to Port Alberni (Very important - when buying a bus ticket to Port Alberni, be careful how you pronounce it. I nearly got sold a ticket to Albany, New York!).

It took a while for Vancouver Island to impress me. It was raining as we left Horseshoe Bay, was blowing a gale on the journey to Nanaimo, and once there was kind of grey and miserable. This made the particular part of Nanaimo we were driving through perhaps even worse than it was. Although it really was just a collection of strip malls, fast food chains and tacky motels, and the bus station that looked like an ideal place to get mugged if you were into that sort of thing.

I found myself still sitting next to a guy who kept telling me that he hated most people, apart from the Scottish, Irish and Kiwi's. Thankfully my beard was looking particularly red that day, so he was convinced I was pure Celt! Passing through the small town of Parksville, we stopped at the bus station to pick some people up. A guy who'd been drinking on the bus the whole time got off to have a cigarette, only to find a random old guy pick up his case from the hold and try and walk off with it. The drunk guy promptly grabbed his case and pushed the old guy. This then prompted the bus driver to shortly after kick the guy off the bus due to being "Concerned about his conduct with relation to the old man"! This prompted the guy sitting next to me let out a little chuckle about once every 5 minutes about it till reaching Port Alberni, an hour or more away!

It wasn't until we turned away from the east coast, and towards Port Alberni that things started to improve. Suddenly the bus was heading through mountains, with lakes and beautiful trees passing alongside. Passing at very high speed I must say, and more than a few times I could be found gripping to the side of the seat fearing that we'd soon leave the road and career into the lake! The driver wasn't hanging around.

Just as the sun came out, we dived in between the trees on either side, and saw signs advertising Cathedral Grove, the main reason I was stopping over in Port Alberni. Cathedral Grove is a stand, on both sides of the highway, of old growth Douglas Fir. Looking from the bus the size of the trees was amazing. I'm sure I didn't see the biggest of the trees, but they seemed unfeasibly tall from the bus.

Now was the crucial part. I hadn't yet figured out the best way to get myself back to Cathedral Grove from Port Alberni. In the guide books, and on the websites that I'd looked at, it had described the grove as "Just outside Port Alberni". I was therefore thinking perhaps I could just walk back, or maybe hire a bike or something, or perhaps even catch a bus. As I sat on the bus expecting to see Port Alberni appear round the next bend, I soon realised that walking or cycling wouldn't be an option, not least as we climbed up, and then down some pretty serious gradients, at least more serious than I'd be willing to climb or cycle up! I then heard the news that there were no buses that would take me there. Bugger!

However, my spirits were raised when I was informed by my landlord for the next two nights (An aging hippy called "Wolf", who had spent about 15 years being a lifty in Australia, New Zealand and Europe, and also lived without electricity or water for another 10 years in Indonesia!) that hitch hiking was amazingly easy there, and that I'd get picked up for sure!

Or so he said. The next day I headed out in the general direction of the grove, heading out to the edge of town, deciding that this would be the best spot for picking up a lift. Firstly, it was about 5 kms to the edge of town, and it took me a while to get there in the amazingly humid heat. Secondly, once I was there I proceeded to stand there and try and hitch for a couple of hours, when I found out that Vancouver Islanders weren't quite as generous as I'd anticipated. I returned, vanquished, had a look through town and returned to the hostel, ready to get out of Alberni, and get to Tofino.

Following another terrifying bus ride along narrow lakeside roads, I got to Tofino, and was impressed straight away! It had the vibe of a Cornish surf town, not one like Newquay or Bude, but one of the ones that hadn't been developed yet, although it was certainly pretty crowded, and I knew for a fact that the town was booked solid, only managing to get into the HI hostel in the games room on the second night dur to it being so crowded.

Tofino is surrounded on both sides by water, with the beautiful Pacific beaches to the west, and wonderful views over the Browning Passage to hundreds of islands. The first night I was there, I just sat outside the hostel, and watched the sun set over the water. I was trying to read a book and listen to music, but was unable to cos I had to keep paying attention to the beautiful sunset, and a friendly cat!

After a good nights sleep, I decided to head out to the Pacific Rim National Park, with my aim being the Rainforest Walk. I had set out with two girls to get there somehow, but due to a combination of one not speaking English, and the fact that it looked as though hitch hiking was probably going to be done, I decided not to continue too far with them. Instead I hired a bike, hopped on and off I went. Of course, once again, what I didn;t realise was the distance involved. The rainforest trail turned out to be 25km away from Tofino, and after numerous stops and side routes I reckon I'd probably cycled 60km. It was pretty good though, and I saw one of the rarest ecosystems in the world, a temparate coastal rainforest. It was quite interesting, with some superb old growth red cedars and hemlocks, and some pretty strange sounding birds. The clouds soon came in though, and I managed to get back in shortly before it started raining. Luckily, the clouds drifted off just in time for another spectacular sunset spent down on the beach.

It was now time to move on. I'd been told I couldn't make the journey from Tofino to Whistler in one day. Facing the prospect of staying in Vancouver for an evening, which would be both annoying and more expensive than I'd planned for. Luckily though everything went to plan, and I made it back to Whistler that evening, ready to plan the next stage.......