WEST COAST TRAIL
The West Coast Trail was a special one for me. Traversing the shoreline of Vancouver Island it passes through the traditional territories of the Pacheedaht, Ditidaht and Huu-ay-aht First Nations. Within their lands were incredible untouched forests with ancient trees and bald eagles watching you from above. I’d look out to sea and witness traditional canoe voyages along the horizon line and whenever I came across a community, they’d greet me with smiles, food and an abundance of stories…
My dad once dove and charted the shipwrecks scattered off this rugged coast, while my mum completed her master’s at the Bamfield Marine Station, the trail’s Northern terminus. Following their footsteps, quite literally, felt like tracing my roots. Each morning opened to the haunting calls of bald eagles, and on more than one occasion I found myself walking parallel to grey whales feeding just metres from shore. Black bears appeared along the trail too — encounters made strangely familiar by the stories I grew up with. Mum’s turnaround point on a run was always a bear sighting, no sooner. Then there were the sea otters, like nothing I’d ever seen before. I counted at least thirty at once. Once wiped out by the fur trade and regionally extinct around Vancouver Island, they’ve since been reintroduced, and seeing them flourishing was deeply moving. Their presence tells a larger story too: by keeping urchin numbers in check, kelp forests are thriving, a living reminder of the interconnectedness of marine ecosystems.
Gloomy fog rolled in and out, in amongst countless beaches where entire afternoons disappeared with the kind of rock pooling my mother would be stoked on. I meandered along tidal shelves, watched the ocean breathe, and let the rhythm of the coast slow everything down. Even now, as I write this, I am faced with so many feelings and emotions after finally connecting with a coastline that means so much to my parents. In a way it’s shaped me into who I am without even knowing it and my days out on the trail have felt like I’ve been getting to know a long lost friend.
