Vancouver Island's West Coast

Victoria is located on the southern tip of Vancouver Island, and is sheltered from the open Pacific by the Olympic Peninsula. However, traveling westward along the island's coast one moves within 40 or 50 kilometers into a much wilder and more robust environment, the West Coast of Vancouver Island. Much of it is not accessible by road. Where the road ends, the West Coast Trail begins, a 75 kilometer hike famous as one of the finest wilderness trails in the world. Fern mentioned on Sunday that we drove west on Saturday and stopped at one of the many beaches along the way, China Beach. The photo above is of one end of China Beach and shows the landscape typical of much of the rugged coastline.

The West Coast II - Botany Bay

Yesterday's photos were taken on the trail that leads to Botanical Beach, our intended destination. However, we ended up on this beach, which I believe is Botany Bay, the northern end of the Juan de Fuca Marine Trail (47 km). To the left we are looking southeast towards Victoria, about 75 km distant. To the right we are looking further up the west coast of Vancouver Island to where the famous West Coast Trail begins.

These beaches are beautiful, there are some sandy areas and there are large waves, but the main attraction here is the tidal pools, many small pools among the rocks that are filled with crystal clear water and a wide variety of shore life such as sea urchins, snails, crabs, anemones, sculpins and millions of mussels. Below are some of the tide pools.

The West Coast

A few hours drive along the coast west and north of Victoria brings one to the true west coast, where the rollers sweep in from the Pacific with only thousands of miles of ocean between here and Japan. It's an incredibly rich, green environment that provides views such as these around every corner of the trail. Tomorrow I'll show you what it's like when you come out of the forest onto the beach.