Hiking in the Pacific Rim National Park Reserve

The Pacific Rim National Park Reserve is administered by Parks Canada and preserves the traditional territory of the Nuu-chah-nulth First Nations. The Nuu-chah-nulth Nation is made up of many individual nations. The territory the Nuu-chah-nulth people collectively call home stretches along the west coast of Vancouver Island. Nuu-chah-nulth people share language, culture and family connections with the Makah Nation on the west coast of Washington State. Hisuk is cawak means "Everthing is One." This holistic principle is central to Nuu-chah-nulth philosophy, and guides every decision a Chief, the governing ruler of a nation, makes.

There are several shortish hikes in the Reserve and a Ranger at the Visitor Center recommended four of them. Today we hiked two; we will attempt the other two tomorrow. Please be aware that many of the pictures below, especially those of the ocean, appear to be black & white, but that is because it was drizzly and foggy along the coast today.

Many of the surfers that we have been seeing around town we in the water today. This picture was taken from the viewing platform at the Kwisitis Visitor Center. The black dots are surfers. If you click on the picture to enlarge it they will still look like black dots, but you can at least see that the dots are people. This is at low tide.

Most of the first hike was through the rain forest, but there were several ocean viewpoints and places to access the beach.

Tree roots do strange things in the rain forest.

95% of the trail was along a boardwalk.

Our lunch spot along Florencia Bay, site of the ship-wreck of the Florencia.

Lunch view straight out to sea and...

another lunch view to the right.

Viewing to the left we could watch the surfing action. (Be sure to click on the picture to pick up some color.)

Back in the rain forest.

 Our second hike was the Shorepine Bog Trail. When we got back to the Visitor Center I suggested to the Ranger that there should be some interpretive signs along this otherwise boring trail. At that point he produced a trail guide and also told us that this is the wrong time of the year to see the interesting parts of the bog. This after he recommended the trail to us earlier in the day.

We spent a bit of time back on the viewing platform at the Visitor Center watching the surfing action.

It was closer to high tide and...

the waves seemed better for all the surfers.