I rode out onto the dock to do the switcheroo. Last time I was here was last winter. It was about the same temperature but blowing hard. It wasn’t pleasant out on the lake that time, especially since I had to paddle back into the wind.

It’s a little lop-sided with no one in it.

Thankfully there were lots of interested people around who were willing to take my picture.

I had a pleasant 45 minute paddle down to the end of the lake. It was spitting a few snowflakes but didn’t amount to anything. Near the end a headwind picked up but I just hugged the shoreline.

At my destination, the dock at the other end of the lake. Another guy came down to ask me about it, and asked if it was electric assist.

No wet feet at all this trip!

Back up and ready to go. I’d cross that bridge and take a multi-purpose hiking / horseback riding trail back. You aren’t allowed to paddle past the bridge as that leads to the intake for the hydroelectric penstock which goes down to the power station on Indian Arm.

I took the “Lakeview Trail”, which actually only had about one view of the lake, filtered through the trees. It is fairly steep, going up and down along the ridge back south. It was nice forest and somewhat technical. Despite all the gear, the bike remained nimble; mostly due to the weight on the front being centred as close to the fork and bars as possible. I had the tire pressure too high but that was OK because I wanted to see what would rattle off, having just been put together.

I took off the left pedal and front wheel and threw the bike in the back, and proceeded to drive home heat-less.

The east end of Downton Lake at the dam

Apparently they produce a kg brick every few weeks.

Ready to head out. The insane flies sure helped the motivation to get moving. I saw on the map that the Lick Creek Trail went up into the mountains in a fairly straightforward path.

I soon discovered that it was a short distance on the map for a reason — it was super steep!

I pushed and pushed and pushed, huffed and puffed, uttered a few curses, strained and grunted and forced my bike up and over each obstacle. The trail was narrow, rutted, loose, and very steep — I guess that’s why it’s such a highly rated downhill ride. I passed one group of bikers heading down. I asked how far it was — I was barely a quarter of the way up. They were incredulous, as was I.

Finally near the Lick Creek headwaters it levelled off a bit in this interesting yellow lichen-encrusted forest.

I set my tent up here. Man, I have to say, that was the second most physically gruelling thing I have done in my life. I pulled my loaded bike up 900 m to 1920 m elevation, but the trail was so unbelievably steep I had to do the last 300 m of the climb twice — once with just my heavy gear, and once again with my bike and remaining gear. So I did 1200 m. I am so glad to have my body back.

While in my tent eating dinner, I heard a large mammal outside.

While doing the final packing of my bike next morning, I happened to scan up and this funny-shaped tree stump caught my eye… He didn’t seem to be at all bothered by me. He just watched. Maybe he was following the deer that went by last night. It’s at times like this that I wish I had brought my dedicated wildlife lens, not the mid-telephoto zoom.

I was packing up in the lower meadow in the centre, and the wolf was watching me from another meadow behind the trees on the very left. Also, you can’t really see it because it’s blown out, but there was a forest fire on the other side of the valley there.

Another 150 m of climbing was in order for this morning to get over the pass into the next valley.

I had to take my pedals off, which really helped on the narrow trail. I was back to doing two loads…

Amazingly, someone even brought a horse up here.

From whence I came

Finally, over the pass at 2050 m, looking down into the next valley I would descend a little ways into, then meet up with another trail heading right (east) up and out again over into the Pearson Valley.

My wolf friend was also using this trail.

It was a shame I had to ride over his tracks but I had to move too.

The meadows going up over the pass to Pearson Creek were like paradise … except for the man-eating bugs.

At the time I didn’t appreciate it, because I was being eaten alive, but each of the alpine flowers had a whole community of insects associated with it. This place was like that wonderland you read about in ecology textbooks, with sunshine filtering through colourful meadow flowers, and all the birds and bees associated with them.

Looking back at another 150 m of climbing to regain the elevation I had lost.

Finally … lunch at the pass, and High Trail going down Pearson Creek.

These little flowers have delicate colour patterns on their petals. You just don’t notice all the intricacies going on until you review the macro shots later. That’s a good lesson I think, to stop and smell the flowers in life. There’s lots more going on around you than you may realize.

Stonecrop

I had 1000 m of descent ahead of me.

I passed a couple going up (look closely). They were going to go down Lick Creek trail. They were only up for the day, so much less heavily loaded than I was. Everyone up here is super fit; how else do you get up here?

One of the more inviting trailheads I’ve come across in my tavels… but I was going down.

Near the bottom of the hill, after all the mud and dust. That sure was a fun descent, but I screwed up my left thumb for a few weeks from all the braking I was doing. I loaded my bike too heavily; it was not performing as I would have liked. I passed another couple going up for a few days and I couldn’t believe how light their kit was. They had backpacks, and plus it helps to have two people, as much of the gear can be shared.

I passed through more hot and dry grassy douglas fir stands.

On the way driving back out, I went by this recent burn.

All clean after my bath in Mowson Pond.

At Pemberton I turned west and headed up the valley bottom to then turn right onto the Hurley Forest Service Road, which is a fairly rough gravel road that leads northwards over the mountains to Gold Bridge.

Looking back to the thunderstorm that was engulfing Pemberton and areas east. I was worried this might start some forest fires.

The Pemberton Valley is scenic potato country.

The Lillooet River goes down the Pemberton Valley, feeding Lillooet Lake before becoming a river again and joining the Fraser River near Chilliwack, via Harrison Lake. It would be an interesting circuit to bikeraft someday.

The Pemberton Valley as seen from The Hurley.

Looking back down to the Pemberton Valley with cows in the fields.

First views of Downton Lake as I descended the other side of The Hurley.

Near the run-of-river works, as far as I could go in the car.

Looking west down Downton Lake, which is actually a reservoir with a dam at its east end.

The 300+ year old douglas firs being perfunctorily cleared and thrown at the side of the road to make way for the powerline right of way.

A better look at the substantial run-of-river project scarring the landscape.

What all the interest is about: Jamie Creek, which presumably doesn’t have any fish in it.

Once over the penstock, I was off. And I had the whole place to myself.

I was stopping every few minutes to eat copious amounts of thimbleberries, which are very sweet and tasty. And there were a few wild raspberries too. Maybe there would be enough berries to make up for my missing breakfast oatmeal.

Poor little bird with a broken wing. There wasn’t much I could do.

This is at the end of Downton Lake where it transitions to a delta. This is a small provincial park with lots of wildlife (but no bears this time of year). Boy I sure am skinny, eh. But that little body can do some amazing things…

On the descent I caught a glimpse of the Bridge River Bridge at 38 km.

The views opened up to reveal the lush green valley. This is a really beautiful place.

The tree species diversity here is high. It is in the dry douglas fir zone on the east side of the mountains. And since the valley runs east/west, on the north side of the valley you have plants adapted to heat and dryness, while on the south side you have more shade and moisture adapted species. Here on the valley bottom were some larch on the left, spruce on the right, and big douglas firs in the back right. In the foreground are thimbleberries. About the only tree species missing are hemlock and yellow cypress.

Crossing the Bridge River. It is raging here.

The ride immediately got hotter as I was now on the north side of the valley in the blazing sun. I was really low on water and starting to cramp but thankfully there was a stream a half kilometer past the bridge.

I plodded along and came upon this stash of diesel.

This is Nichols Creek, which is the valley to the east of the unnamed valley I was going to go up. The bridge over this creek is in rough shape, I don’t know how much longer it will be drivable. That creek is too dangerous to cross without a bridge. And the road is deactivated at this point so if the bridge goes, who knows if it will be replaced.

I just kept hammering in the heat. The scenery was very beautiful, but I can sometimes tune out where I am if I am doing intense physical activity. Here I had reached my limit and had to take a break to eat some food and drink some water. I was using Nuun electrolyte tablets in my water which seemed to be working and keeping the cramps away.

I came upon this set of prints from the King of the Valley walking in the opposite direction I was riding, meaning I had already passed him. I’m not sure if he heard me coming and took off or just left the road before I came by. I guess I’ll never know… Luckily we didn’t meet. That was a BIG bear.

With the road blocked off there was no vehicle traffic. The wheel tracks became highways for wildlife, covered with deer, wolf and bear tracks.

I stopped to filter water at this idyllic little stream. You can’t really see it in this picture, but the flowers were really pretty.

My loaded rig.

I was mostly climbing in elevation, going up the northern side of the valley. This is looking back to where I came from.

It is a very scenic valley.

I called it quits for the day, about 5-10 km from the end of the road; I wasn’t quite sure how far it went. I found a nice spot where it levelled off and was near a stream. No worries about blocking traffic here…

Camp just happened to be at the 52 km mark. I started at 15.5 km that morning, so I did 36.5 km that day. It was a hard ride though, with the heat (30 C +), and altitude (1100 m), and total elevation gain of about 800 m including the little escapade up and down the other side of the valley. Plus I had the weight of all my gear. I was pretty beat and didn’t sleep very well because of that.

The flight goes right by Yosemite.

Mark picked me up at LAX, then we ran some errands, including going down to the Marine Institute at Los Angeles Harbour…

… to pick up a bottle of Nitrox we’d use to refill the tires at some point on the trip, after we leave the gravel and get back on pavement (for a smoother ride off road, you air down the tires. But this low pressure isn’t good on sealed roads).

First wildlife sighting of the trip.

Long Beach

Feral parrots are still living in the palm trees at Belmont Pier in Long Beach, right where I used to live.

Getting my stuff together at Mark’s house. We left 3:30 Sunday morning to avoid freeway traffic and to arrive at our destination not too late.

We zoomed down to San Diego, then turned east on Interstate 8. Over the pass into the Imperial Valley is windy, and the turbines appeared against the sunrise.

Dieseling up at Calexico before crossing the border. I’m a conspiracy buff myself, but are they “chem”trails, or just “con”trails from water vapour from combustion in the plane’s engines? C6H14 + O2 –> CO2 + H20

Marathon in Mexicali

700 km later, we hit San Felipe for breakfast and did some tourist shopping. Here we are, stuck in traffic on the strip.

They are paving the road all the way south from San Felipe. Very sad to see the gravel road go, that was a classic. They want “development”. The problem now is you can’t get off the highway down to the little coves we used to go to.

Finally hitting gravel, and airing down. They have only gotten so far with the paving.

Once across this arroyo with a bridge, the pavement will continue.

Shortly afterwards (150 km from San Felipe) we got to Alfonsinas, which is a spit a few kilometers long that has a row of beachfront houses along it. Alongside the spit is a runway and many people fly in rather than drive.

At the end of the spit is a restaurant / hotel. But the tide was extremely high that afternoon so we couldn’t get over (that’s the runway submerged).

Oh darn, we had to wait it out on the beach.

Quincy

Finally … dinner.

Looking back down the spit from the restaurant

Frigate

These gigantic 2″ wasp things were quite common most places we went.

We didn’t have a proper bike rack so we just lashed my bike to the front grill. I thought I had put padding on all the rub points…

Damn! Missed one! Ouch! That was nasty, but it didn’t seem to be in a critical location. The perils of owning an aluminum bike…

It rides very well on the sand, much better than on snow. The tidal range here is huge, wider than anywhere I’ve seen.

The palapa I set my tent up in. There are a few reasons it is open on this side, and closed on the other. One is the view of the beach, and the other is…

That evening, all of a sudden, the winds shifted from a nice gentle sea breeze to coming from the desert, blowing out off the interior. It got stinking hot and ferocious for most of the night. I got to set my brand new tent up in the dark, for the first time, in the windy palapa. I was peppered with a fine dusting of sand that made it through the thatch.

The sand dollars are a little different down here.

Up from the beach at the road is a store / restaurant. We were sitting there eating dinner when this monstrosity pulled up.

It was John and Betti from the UK! They shipped it over to Halifax and drove around Canada in winter, then made their way south through the US. They had just entered Mexico en route to South America. One of the first things he said to me was, “You must really love the sun!” If you’ve seen me in Mexico you actually haven’t seen much of me, because I cover up. You don’t want to mess with skin cancer! There’s a reason the Arabs wear sheets. I’m a pasty northerner, I’m not sand people.

It’s a Mercedes fire truck that he converted over. He made the box himself.

Being from the UK, he really doesn’t like Range Rovers. Of course, a whole pack of them pulled up beside us.

I awoke at the break of dawn at 5 a.m. to a train rumbling by. I decided I’d just crawl along the highway and see how far I got.

Amazingly I got to Whistler Creekside! I pulled into a restaurant at 6:30 and plugged in for 20 minutes. This is the view up Whistler Mountain while I waited.

Then I went down to the free Level 2 charger at the City Hall. There are also 4 more chargers across the street in the Day Lots (beside those trees on the very left), which are a bit more secluded and shaded. I’ll go there next time.

Lost Lake with most of my gear, minus my packraft and snowshoes and pfd.

This is “disc golf”, whatever that is. Probably some weird legacy from the Olympics.

In summer Whistler turns into a mountain biking mecca.

Since I got there on Friday afternoon before a Monday long weekend I got the best spot in the lot — shaded all day, which is important for keeping the car from turning into an oven which is not good for the batteries.

Along the way, the Cheakamus River was raging over the Daisy Lake dam.

At Brandywine Falls there was this map showing the historical native bands. It described them as being excellent mountaineers. I wondered how I’d compare on this trip…

It was very lightly raining the whole way which kept me nice and cool.

Taking a few seconds off from swatting mosquitos to look back down the road.

I got to Callaghan Lake and there were a couple other cars there with campers.

Callaghan Lake in the rain

I set up camp, had dinner, and then went to bed.

The worst bear cache ever, but at least it got the bags off the ground.

All the pollen was collecting at this end of the lake.

The exit from Callaghan Lake

Thick pollen

I packed up and headed for the trail I took three months earlier in the snow. Unfortunately it was still half covered in snow, and the trail was narrow and tortuous through the mud and roots.

I lugged my bike through a few kilometers of that before finally hitting the main service road up.

That was much better, but the further I went up, the more snow-covered it was, and it was not easy lugging my bike over the snow.

I got to the lodge and turned off the trail towards Conflict Lake. I could see that on the other side there were lots of bare patches, being south facing, and that was where I would be going up towards Ring Pass. I could see that the final push up to Ring Lake was very steep and there was no way I’d be able to do it in the time I had. Damn! Thwarted again!

But wait! I have an inflatable mattress!

Perfect!

Ring Pass. Someday I’ll get there… Maybe in September when there’s no snow.

The next day I headed back down, along a different trail, the lower “Wild Spirit” trail, which is a rough road suitable for quads. It was hot that day.

Summer had sprung.

The farther down I got, the hotter it got and the more luxurient the forest became.

Very pleasant riding through 10 km of old growth cypress / balsam / hemlock.

Black Tusk over Callaghan Creek

Alexander Falls. It’s pretty big.

The final 3 km was the steep push up to the parking. The lot was very busy, being a summer long weekend. I timed that well. I decided to push myself as hard as I could up the hill, for training purposes, because I had no more cycling to do after that. It was really hot.

Fresh powder across from Brittania Beach

A little further along, coming into Squamish and this view of Mount Garibaldi

Above the highway, looking back down the Cheakamus Valley towards Squamish and Vancouver. The Squamish Valley merges from the right just over that hill. I was hoping to end the circle tour by packrafting down the Squamish to where you’re looking, and riding my bike back up the Cheakamus below to further up the valley where I’d park my car.

That’s Cloudburst Mountain! That I never actually saw last time when I circumnavigated it.

Tired of looking at Cloudburst Mountain yet?

I ended up parking in a big lot at the valley bottom, beside the Whistler garbage transfer station, that snowmobilers use. The guy charged me $10 for two nights, half the normal rate for snowmobilers because I wasn’t snowmobiling. Finding overnight parking up the Callaghan Valley is particularly tough apparently, especially in winter.

Ready to go on my first winter bikepacking trip.

Looking up the road. It was fairly busy.

Looking back across the Cheakamus to the ever watchful Black Tusk (2400 m) towering over the whole area.

The road crosses the Callaghan River.

Handlebars: small sleeping bag, rain jacket
Front fork: water on right, alcohol on left. Thermarest on right in green sack, some freeze dried dinners on left in blue sack. GoPro video camera mounted above front wheel looking forward.
Top tube: Zip Shot tripod velcro strapped to the tube for quick removal, and rain pants strapped up front.
Under down tube: tire pump, and GoPro camera looking forward behind front wheel.
Frame bag: cell phone, food, tools, water filter, a few clothes.
Rear rack: packraft in blue sack, paddle shafts, snowshoes, cookset against seat tube, and bear spray wedged in there for quick access.
Panniers: one contains winter sleeping bag, other one contains my too-large tent and more clothes. Various remaining knicknacks throughout as well. Each contained one paddle blade.

Up and up…

I was running low on water but there were a few groundwater / meltwater streams beside the road which I could use to fill my bottles, without having to filter.

I could hear a helicopter flying back country skiers in to the mountains across the valley.

Back country skier tracks

Snowmobiler tracks. There are actually two black dots in there (top, left of center) which are the snowmobilers.

The valley beckoned.

On the way there I passed some guests from the lodge coming down the access road I was climbing. They were all very interested in my bike. For once, I was the tourist attraction. That’s not me.

I was hoping the trail would flatten out after Callaghan Lake, which it did for a short while, but then it started climbing for a few more kilometers.

The snow was kind of melting down at the bottom but at the top it was still fresh powder. It wasn’t crusty.

Riding these kinds of trails requires active thermal management. As the saying goes for winter travel, “If you sweat, you die”, so I was pulling layers off to stay cool when climbing. But then if I’d have a downhill section I’d have to put them back on.

I basically got to the end of the trail and crashed, and set up camp 20 feet beyond…

Paul at work told me a trick to avoid soaking your boots from the snow — wrap them in plastic bags. This worked reasonably well but some snow still got in there. The plastic was pretty thin and some holes developed.

That was it for the day.

View from my tent

Another challenge I anticipated was that the stove would melt through the snow and collapse, so I cleverly brought along some tinfoil to place it on. But it was too thin and the stove still ended up tilting a bit. With all the snow melting, etc. I used about twice the alcohol I usually do.

Ring Pass is thataway.

Morning flurries

Conflict Lake is quite scenic. Until I traipsed across it with my snowraft, that is…

It’s pretty hard to pull through the snow. I think that’s because of the rubber bottom material which isn’t very slippery. I will try to find some more slidy material to put underneath for pulling across the snow.

That’s Ring Pass, right of center.

After a kilometer around one side of Conflict Lake I’d had enough and rejoined the cross country ski trail to flip back over to my bike again.

Doing the switcheroo in the blazing sunlight and strong winds, and cold temperatures.

Above you can see the track the skiers used to climb up to the knoll on the right. And below this track you can see all their ski tracks when they carved their way back down. I’ve never done back country skiing, maybe I should try. No time though, or money. Too many other things to do.

Nice bike portrait in the forest on my way back down

Crossing Callaghan Creek the other way.

That’s it!

I put my boat together on the rocky beach and then launched. Looking north up Howe Sound. I went left.

Rounding the points heading towards Whytecliffe Park, looking back up Howe Sound to where I came from.

There was a pod of seals around Whytecliffe Park.

Racing out from Eagle Marine

There was also a flock of seagulls hanging out on some intertidal rocks here. I had gotten my long lens only a year before and this was one of the first times I had used it in my bobbing kayak. Most shots were blurry.

The winds were coming from behind me, from the west. When I went by Lighthouse Park it got quite choppy as they slammed against the west-facing vertical walls.

Looking the other direction. This is a popular place for climbers to practice. Look closely.

The park’s namesake.

I continued along in front of all the waterfront houses. Eventually these made way to the public access sea wall and beaches.

Approaching Ambleside

Bright sunshine in the morning

I headed over to Shearwater, and I planned to paddle back to the ferry terminal in the evening.

Times gone by

I finally got into town and pulled up next to the harbour master with my boat roasting in the sun. I thought I might have to let some air out but it was OK.

I had lunch in the pub which was blaring some asinine television. Here we go again, culture shock. I then bought a book about the local wolves, written by Ian Mcallister, a local here who has been studying them for the last number of years, and who was instrumental in lobbying for the limited protection this area does enjoy, the so-called “Great Bear Rainforest”. The wolves are very interesting and it’s well worth the read. I have a soft spot for dogs so I love wolves. We used to have a wolf hybrid who looked very much like the one on the cover of the book. And it seems wolves have a soft spot for us too — they virtually never attack people.

As I sat in the sun, reading my book and looking out across the channel, I felt a real sense of accomplishment. I had gotten about 1/3 of the way to Haines; this was a major milestone for me and I had done it all on my own power (except of course, flying in and out between seasons). My pace had been way slower than I originally anticipated, but here I was! It’s about the journey, not the destination, as the saying goes.

It turns out the ferry also goes to Shearwater on its way south so I just waited there. I’ll see Bella Bella next year. This is the new ferry terminal.

Here comes my ride.

The boat didn’t leave Bella Bella until about 11 pm. It was jam packed full of people and they all threw down mattresses. The floor was wall to wall people. I pitched my tent out on the deck.

Morning.

Next year I hope to stay put in one place for a while somewhere up around Princess Royal Island and spend some time with wolves. I also want to see the white kermode bears.

You can see how high the tide came up, from the tideline to the right. Now just imagine me, standing in the dark, at midnight, with all my gear up on that green grassy / rocky area, cursing the tide. It’s kind of funny thinking back to it and I should have taken the opportunity to commune with nature under the moonlight. But all the frustrations from the last few days just came out. I felt much better by morning!

This is one of those times when I wish I had some time lapse video to show this starfish moving along that rock.

One of these anemones is not like the others… but they are of the same genus, Anthopleura.

It was the season when the kelp starts to fall apart and calls it quits for the year.

More calm skies. I lazily followed the shoreline up all day in the sunshine. What a nice way to end the trip. But, just like last year, the nice weather didn’t seem to arrive until the last day!

I think this is a solitary sandpiper. Definitely not on sand.

I was kicking myself for not checking the ferry schedule back at Hakai Beach Institute. I had no cell phone reception so I couldn’t get on the internet. At least I knew the ferry went north today. But would it head south tonight? Tomorrow? Three days from now? I wouldn’t know until I got into town unfortunately. I may have spent another night out if I had known, and I passed by an interesting crushed shell campsite that apparently has petroglyphs, because I didn’t want to miss the ferry.

This fishing boat was trawling and was just offshore from my campsite when I set off in the morning. They kept pace with me all day into Bella Bella.

As I was crossing a big bay the stormclouds brewed above me. I wasn’t in my drysuit. They soon burst and I raced to the other side to take shelter under this cliff and was almost totally out of the rain for about a half hour.

One of the last points before reaching Bella Bella.

Hah, and we were back to jumping salmon. The closer I got to town, the more frequent they became.

Nice! There is a hatchery on a creek right by the ferry terminal and they were all back for that. It seemed everyone and his dog was out in his boat trying to catch them but they didn’t seem to be biting much.

I came ashore at the ferry terminal and called my mom on the payphone to get the ferry schedule — tomorrow evening the red-eye came through. OK, that was settled. I wouldn’t fly back.

I wasn’t sure where to camp so I paddled another few kilometers into town. It was getting late and when I got to that public wharf it was really busy so I decided to head back to the ferry terminal and camp there.

I guess that’s why the tide was so high last night! The ferry terminal wasn’t the best place to camp because it’s at the end of one of the few roads on the island so anyone who has a car drives out there to see what’s going on, and they also came to see the salmon. So I had lots of cars drive by me, and a few people stopped to say hi. One lady warned me about a black bear in the area.

There is another beach at this site that was an easier put-in.

I was ready for the weather, and it was still blowing from the south. I wasn’t complaining.

I took refuge behind this rock, the last sheltered place before going out into open water. This is looking north and you can barely see Superstition Point on the right. I hung around here for about half an hour and eventually I couldn’t see Super Point anymore from all the rain. My boat was filling up with water. This is a problem because my drybags don’t really seal up. They provide protection from splashes but my electronics bag was placed sideways lying down on the floor in front of me, and there was about 2 inches of water in the bottom of my boat. I was worried this was going to flood my bags.

After paddling a small portion of exposed water and getting blown around pretty hard I entered the calm inlet leading to the portage. The rain continued and my boat turned into a bathtub.

I had to search around at the head of the inlet a little bit but I soon found the ribbon marking the trail.

I hiked the 100 meters five times for all my gear. I stayed in my drysuit and wore my sandals. I was a little worried I might poke a hole in my drysuit feet, but there wasn’t any gravel or anything else sharp to poke it. The trail was thick organic matter and peat moss. The forest was really beautiful old growth cedar. At one place a tree had fallen over the trail and I thought I should have used my saw to clear it a bit, but I was in no state to be doing that.

Finally, as I finished portaging my stuff over, the rain eased up. That was probably some of the most intense rain I have ever been in. It lasted for a good hour and a half and dumped about 3 or 4 inches, judging by the water in my boat. I climbed up a little bank on the right side to fill up my water bottles with all the water gushing out of the moss, no filtering required. This meadow was covered with goose crap.

Then the sun came out! And my gear was dry! I was perfectly dry in my drysuit! The extent of the water damage was the foggy lens you see in the above photo, which dried out pretty fast. I had lunch of peanut butter on mango, and energy bars. It seems I’m getting better at managing the rain. I still need to figure out how to get a quick and reliable way of making a front porch out of a tarp.

I was soon off again.

They don’t seem to mind the rain.

Shortly afterwards I passed another raging creek discharging gobs of foam into the sea.

I took advantage of the wind and sun to dry out my tent.

A black katy chiton. There is interesting intertidal life here. It doesn’t get bashed by the open ocean so much because the area is sheltered by Goose Island, a fairly large offshore island that I chose not to visit because doing so involves a long open crossing. It is supposed to be an interesting place though, with lots of bird life. And the northern tip is the site of the First Nations youth correction program, which involves banishing troubled youths to a few months of solitude in the wilderness. They seem to return as changed individuals — something we could learn from. Inmates leave regular prisons worse criminals than when they went in.

An interesting sand anemone that I haven’t yet ID’d.

I got another fire going which wasn’t easy due to both the wind and the lack of dry material to burn. I was running out of garbage to get it going.

If you go to the dead center of this map, then look a little to the left, you will see a turquoise bay. Go check it out on Google Earth where you can zoom in more. I think they took the satellite image when the herring were spawning in that bay.

There is a little creek tumbling into the water down a rocky waterfall just up the shore a bit. I stopped and filled up with water and because it was groundwater I didn’t filter it. I thought I’d try drying my shorts out in the weather on my mast.

But the rain was coming from behind. It hit me but didn’t last very long. That’s the way it seems to be out here, at least in summer. Everything blows through really fast so the rain is fairly intense but doesn’t last for long.

As I rounded the final point on Sterling Island before heading west out the channel back to the open ocean, I noticed wolf trails leading down to the water. They have a whole network across the island and will regularly run the routes looking for food, timed with the tides. It would be interesting to hike them, but you’d have to be prepared to crouch down a lot.

As I continued crossing to Kidney Island I went by a noisy gaggle of gulls making a fuss. I didn’t know what it was all about but in reviewing the photos it was another boil of sand lances.

It was here that I spotted this kelp crab in the kelp. Apparently the scuba diving around here is really good.

I moved out to go down the channel and then looked back to see this jewel of a protected beach on Triquette Island! What? It wasn’t on my map! Actually, yes it was, but I was in a different place than I thought I was.

I paddled back up from where you are looking, against the raging seas and currents. It took almost half an hour to get over from that point. It’s a really nice beach with a developed campsite. And the open ocean is right on the other side of the trees, behind where I’m taking this photo. I heard some cranes too; apparently there is a nice mudflat just to the west of here. However, the sand is very fine and given that it was only 3 pm I decided to move on. But as you can see, with the falling tide my boat got beached so I had to slide it back into the water on logs.

It didn’t take long to reach the campsite on Enda Island. My shorts didn’t dry out very well with all the rain. And you’d think I would have realized to take them down since I was getting bashed by the wind…

The site was fine sand again, oh well. There is quite a bit of garbage washed up here, and interestingly a bunch of large plastic pipes half buried in the sand.

Along with the garbage there is a lot of driftwood and I found a few dry pieces of cedar. I had brought along all the wood I chopped the previous night, which imparted a wonderful cedar smell to my bag, but it wouldn’t burn properly as it was too wet. Anyways, I managed to get a fire going long enough to cook dinner, which was pasta primavera. The rain was on and off, and it was starting to get on my nerves. The sun poked out for 5 minutes. At least there wasn’t any bugs.

The sun came out by morning.

Calvert Island is more piney / boggy due to the nutrient-poor granitic soils.

I hiked back.

And came upon this little guy doing what frogs are supposed to do.

On the trail back from the beach I bumped into this deer that jumped into the wet bushes at the first open spot.

After checking email again and repacking I was ready to go. Then it started pouring.

I got all snug in my drysuit and set off. Then it stopped raining. This is looking east through the channel between Hecate and Calvert Islands, with the mainland in the distance across Fitz Hugh Sound.

I slowly made my way back up the channel heading north. I had a slight headwind and I wanted to be really careful with my shoulder so I just hugged the shoreline and crawled up.

I got to the last point before heading across Hakai Passage and ate some lunch in a kelp bed.

That ain’t no seal! That’s a sea otter! Finally — I’ve never seen them before in the wild!

This one was curious and got quite close. They aren’t so skittish like river otters.

There was a family of about five individuals that called this kelp bed home.

He went down and brought up a large California mussel. If you don’t know the story of sea otters, you should read up on it. They are a “keystone species“, or one that totally changes the nature of their ecosystem. They used to be plentiful in BC but the fur traders almost wiped them out. But they eat sea urchins. And sea urchins eat kelp… So with no otters around anymore, so went the kelp forests which are an important nursery for many species of fish. They’ve been moving south again from Alaska, and they are now down to at least Ucluelet on Vancouver Island. Along with this, the kelp beds are coming back.

Aww, look at the baybay! Elaine, look at the baybay!

After the weather started to get a bit worse I moved on and crossed over to Sterling Island where there was a campsite marked on my map. I was really fighting the current so I hit the shoreline as fast as possible after rounding this cormorant rock. It was 15 km to paddle today but it seemed longer.

Just let me sleep…

The rain came and I didn’t have my drysuit zipped up underneath my raincoat. My raincoat leaks in in the neck in heavy rain. Oh well. I was really happy with this campsite.

This is a great little protected bay / beach looking northwards.

And the wolves had been here.

Climbing over logs

Wolf sign

It is another crushed shell beach, another likely midden site. They are all over the place here. Great for throwing your tent down.

This beach has a large variety of berry species. Here is the ubiquitous huckleberry again.

This is thimbleberry which is related to salmonberry, but very sweet. The berries only last a couple days, if that.

Salal

Black currant

A different type of currant

Alaska blueberry

I never though barnacles made noise, but they do. If I touched this log they would all start seething en masse.

Above the beach was this canoe, and a downed cedar tree.

Luckily I brought my axe / saw combo. And I’ve watched enough Survivorman to know how to get a fire going the hard way — with a lighter, dry paper, and kindling…

The fire wasn’t easy to get going or keep going with the wood being so wet, but I managed to keep it alive long enough to boil the water.

Usnea lichen hanging from trees.

Some unlucky sand fleas

Western sandpipers in the mud in the morning

I only had 4 km to get to the Beach Institute. My shoulder was still sore so I took it really slowly. I’ve dealt with tendonitis and similar conditions enough to know that you just can’t push it. You have to let it heal.

This place was a bit of an apparition. It is a bustling little university campus in the middle of the wilderness. It used to be a fishing lodge but the new owner decided to do something different with it and joined up with the local First Nations to turn it into an environmental science field station.

They have an impressive solar farm and battery bank (and big diesel generator). This is one of those times however when you wonder how much energy was required to build the renewable energy system versus how much it will ultimately produce. That isn’t a criticism, since in remote locations you need to have local energy supply, but more of a recognition of a problem we will encounter everywhere in the future as we transition to renewables by necessity because fossil fuels run out.

The perfectly manicured grounds just seemed bizarre. They are very open to visitors here, offering free wifi and fresh water. And I could plug in my battery chargers. But they don’t provide food or have anything for sale. I sat at the info building at the top of the ramp and went on my computer. Lots of boaters came up to check it out, and I had some good conversations about their trips. One couple hadn’t set foot on solid ground for a few weeks. I ended up being the information person for visitors for a couple hours as I found out the answers to the questions I was wondering, that other boaters were also asking when they arrived. Kind of funny, I fit the part, and had to tell people that I didn’t actually work there.

I hiked across to West Beach. I had hoped to see some wolves here, but there were just too many people around. One of the guys said that there is another beach further up that may have them, it’s called “wolf beach”. But I didn’t feel like putting in the effort to bushwhack to it.

Instead I was going to hike up to the lookout and camp there. It’s amazing how I could barely fit my stuff for one night in my backpack. The rest of my stuff I left at the Institute. I really need to focus on slimming down my gear.

Thick west coast mud

Gnarly

That’s where I was going.

Very recent trail building

There’s a nice panoramic view up here. It isn’t very high, Google Earth says only 50 m but I think it’s higher than that.

Looking north to where I’d be kayaking tomorrow.

The black flies were really bad up here. I didn’t cook my dinner, I just ate some energy bars and looked for a tent site which was really hard to find. I ended up on a rounded granite outcrop that wouldn’t flood if it rained. I went in my tent ASAP and listened to the weather report which was calling for rain. I was pretty exposed up here at the top of this hill. I didn’t bring my mattress from lack of space so I slept on my empty backpack.

A phalarope of some sort. I passed lots of seabirds; you notice a lot more life out on the water when it’s calm. I came upon one little guy sleeping while floating. He had tucked his beak into his feathers and was snoozing away. Just as I got my camera out he woke up and took off. This one above was less wary of me, having seen me coming.

Interesting cloud patterns on the water that day.

The water changed from deep clear blue to more like green pea soup as I passed through algae blooms. Believe it or not, but this is the stuff that powers our economies. Oil comes from plankton that settled out onto the floor of ancient seas hundreds of millions of years ago. Remember that when some economist or oil industry apologist tries to convince you that we should accept environmental degradation for the greater purpose of powering economic growth based on fossil fuel extraction. Anyone who tells you that ecology is subservient to economics is either lying or totally delusional. They’ve got it completely backwards. And when you see images of the industrial landscapes across Alberta with all the upgraders and refineries processing the oil sands, and you’re told that, “it’s the price of progress”, No! Don’t believe it! Progress does not come from burning up irreplaceable energy reserves at a rate 200,000 times greater than deposition rates! Remember that no matter how hard they try to hype that technology up, those industries aren’t “producing” petroleum, or anything else for that matter; all they’re doing is harvesting and burning that green stuff you see in the above photo. Without this oceanic equivalent of … pond scum, the Alberta oil companies are nothing! The Alberta economy is quite literally subservient to pond scum (not that there’s anything wrong with pond scum). We are still completely dependent on ecology for our survival.

Then they moved away up north.

They started feeding as a group…

The luxury yacht that was enjoying the show along with me.

I wanted to go check out the Hakai Beach Institute down on Calvert Island, so I crossed over Hakai Channel. I was in the influence of the open ocean now and there were big swells with huge wavelengths. They were crashing hard on the rocks but I was able to get in really close safely. I took some interesting video showing the size of the waves.

After taking lunch in a semi-protected kelp bed I continued south down the channel. This is Hecate Island in all its glory.

My shoulder was getting really sore so I was taking it easy. I slowly followed the shoreline down, keeping an eye out for campsites. There didn’t seem to be a whole lot of opportunities.

I had been thinking about how I could carry more water with me, as I would be going through Hakai which consists of many little islands without much water available. After the scary situation in the Broughtons two years ago I wanted to make sure I had spare capacity. Well, like magic, I found this brand new, never-opened water bottle on the beach… among the only garbage to be found. It probably fell off a fishing boat at the lodge. It wasn’t very big, but an odd occurrence. Kind of weird, and this happened back at Shelter Bay too. When I wished for a jug of fresh water, it just washed up on the beach the next morning!

A pair of noisy sandhill cranes flew overhead in the direction you’re looking. And I caught glimpses of some sort of little weasel racing along the edge of the vegetation. I pondered that even though when I arrive at new places I can get a bit lonely before I get to know them, and that no matter how sterilized and impersonal a map may make a place seem, it is inevitably someone’s or some animal’s home. Every place is unique and special. Was this my home too?

This is a good camping spot as the tide didn’t flood the whole beach, leaving enough space for my tent. In a storm surge it might flood though. And there is a creek nearby.

The weather was decent.

The dogs had been barking most of the night and they came over to say hi while I loaded up. I felt like I should give something back. I tried offering a peanut butter covered date but it wasn’t a hit.

I headed up the river to the estuary and went by this gull that seemed to follow me. It got quite close.

The tide was way down. And the water was brown due to all the tannin runoff from the rain. The salmon were gone. Overnight, the seasons had changed.

It was the season of plenty with berries everywhere and salmon in the rivers.

There was a noisy pair of eagles near here.

Misty, mossy mountains

Ahh, there must be something going on upriver…

I passed a family of river otters and there was a funny noise coming from a half submerged tree on the bank. It took a while to find the source which was a baby otter and mother. It was super cute but I couldn’t get a shot of it in time.

As the meadow came into view I saw a black blob moving along the shore.

The river was getting shallow and I had to get out and start walking up. These headless salmon are from wolves. They only eat the heads, some think it’s due to parasites in the meat they want to avoid. We have an advantage because we can cook our food.

The place was noisy too with some Canada Geese.

It wasn’t long before I saw the wolves on the opposite bank, near where a branch tributary of the main river was joining and forcing the salmon to go through shallow water. The bear that was wandering down the shore joined them.

It turns out I was pretty lucky to see the wolves. They normally only come out at night and they avoid people. Considering that there there’s usually a person or two coming up to the estuary every day for various reasons, I’m surprised I saw them. The timing of the low tide helped with that. I was pretty far away but the clicking of my camera sent them off. Damn you Nikon!!! Time for a new body. Maybe the D400 when it comes out.

I went further up to a main junction where there were some salmon making their way up the shallows. They are really hard to get close to, I’m impressed the animals can catch them. I contemplated going up the side channel a bit to see what was there but the water was too shallow. Good thing too, because a few minutes later I looked up that channel to see a mother and cub come wander around. Too bad there was a tree in the way!

I never did actually get a good shot of the two together. Then they ambled off again.

The meadow seems to consist of sticky organic mud matted together with grass roots.

The forest here is very beautiful. It is old growth and has never been logged. There is something magical about being in it.

Biological oils from all the productivity going on here were getting caught up in the downed logs. These licorice ferns were making one last dash for life.

I spent over half a day up the estuary, and the time went by really fast. As I was heading back out with the tide the bear was back at the salmon spot, but the tide was high so he wasn’t catching any salmon.

I find that my kayak is somewhat limiting in some respects. I’d like to be able to ditch a lot of my gear sometimes and just go up the river for a few days and camp out. I would love to camp in the forest overlooking this feeding spot and get up with the break of dawn to see the wolves. That way I wouldn’t disturb them, I could remain in the forest. But what would I do with my stuff and food? Without a sailboat or something similar to store my food and excess gear in out at the bay, I can’t do that. Oh well, the kayak provides other advantages.

OK, last shot.

Everything is covered with growth here.

I came back to that friendly gull. He was sitting on some rocks and wasn’t at all afraid of me. I put my paddle up to him and he climbed on board. I thought I could have a new pet. But then I realized he might be sick, who knows, maybe with avian flu or something. So I put him back.

As I rounded the bend into the bay I looked out to the ocean and saw the big triangular mouth of a humpback shooting out of the water right at the entrance to the bay. I couldn’t believe how much life there is here. I went out and tied up to the kelp but he had left.

Evening light looking up the Koeye Valley. Yet another fantastic day in another fantastic place along our coast.

And there, standing about 4 feet away from me (more like, above me), was a grizzly bear.

Thankfully he was just investigating and then continued poking around down the beach.

He casually made his way around the bay, past the longhouse to the lodge construction site.

Anyways, a few seconds later I saw that it was the bear dogs on their way back, stopping by to say hello. They tried to get in my tent but I wasn’t having that.

This is the young guy.

The older, more wise of the two.

For most of the day they hung out with me. They knew their job — to protect people from bears, and they did it well. They slept most of the day, as they seem to be barking throughout the night at every noise or scent they pick up.

Not a huge bear — probably an adolescent just getting into mischief.

It rained on and off for most of the day and I had no initiative to do anything. But lying in this downward position all day was really causing me a lot of muscle ache. Stretching out didn’t help.

The gulls making a fuss over something.

Poking around the forest behind my tent.

The place with all the action. It’s kind of interesting, the kids’ camp is located almost a kilometer away from the main lodge, up the river above another sandy beach. That seems to be where the bears go through as there are lots of tracks there. But, there doesn’t appear to be any problems.

I headed north across the bay.

Every piece of “dry” land here above the tide line is covered with thick vegetation.

Looking west across to Calvert Island with Addenbroke and Sweeper Islands in the foreground.

Yes, the sea she was angry that day! But only if you were heading south. Or over at Calvert Island where there was showers. I was laughing where I was!

The narrow channel between Sweeper and Addenbroke Island

Looking north

Looking east up Fish Egg Inlet. Just more of my big playground…

I love the patterns of old growth cedar.

Solar powered light station

With such a nice tailwind I had some lunch as I drifted north. Peanut butter, Persian dates and dried mangoes.

The Koeye River empties into the chuck before that mountain. It’s well hidden in a small bay.

As I made the final approach I turned crosswind to get around the headland protecting Koeye Bay. The big winds had created some decent sized waves, plus there are open ocean waves pounding this shore as well. They were all bouncing off the rocky shoreline creating a few tense moments as I made my way across. I made it though and here I was rounding the final point.

The Koeye watershed is a fairly recent conservancy and is sacred to the Heiltsuk First Nation. They had a lodge here which burned down last year. They are rebuilding it now.

I went up to say hi.  There was a Nature Conservancy guy here hiking the trails with a group of First Nations grizzly researchers from Bella Bella. They have set up barbed wires along the bear trails to snag tufts of hair which they then send off for DNA analysis. They were up the trails today. If only I had been here a day earlier, I could have gone with them! I said that I’d camp on the beach on the opposite side and the work crew foreman said that was fine, although there has been a bear wandering around some mornings. He wasn’t overly talkative so after a few minutes talking about things I headed down to go look up the river.

Norwegian Camp is an old mine just up the river from the bay.

The tide was still rising and I rode it into the estuary. It is an interesting place because there is a kilometer of river protecting the estuary which is a ways back from the ocean.

The river was low since there hadn’t been much rain lately. The water was warm and crystal clear and I could see salmon zooming around underneath me. They were pinks waiting for the rains. They were jumping all around me. I couldn’t stop laughing, it was so funny, there were thousands of them. It’s not easy to get a picture of a jumping salmon but here it is.

Looking up the estuary

Rain was starting in the mountains.

It soon moved down to the estuary so I decided to take refuge under a tree and wait for the tide to turn so I could ride it back out.

Just as I was getting back to the bay it started to pour. I set up my tarp and tent in the rain with the fine beach sand getting everywhere.

The gulls taking a break for the evening.

Then the sun came out! I shoulda waited and set up my tent in the dry!

And of course a rainbow.