Fisgard Lighthouse

Today was our last day on V.I. We had the morning in Victoria to check out Fisgard Lighthouse before an afternoon flight back to Calgary.

The Fisgard Lighthouse site is situated about 20 mins drive west of Victoria Harbour. It isn't just a lighthouse, itis also an historical site containing WWII battlements.

There's plenty of war memorabilia around the site.

The views from some of the bunkers and battlements are fantastic.

The lighthouse sits out on a peninsular separated from the military buildings.

Fisgard Lighthouse is well worth checking out if you are in Victoria.

We were able to get a direct flight from V.I. to Calgary, so there was no annoying stop over in Vancouver. The afternoon was clear so we were able to get a great look at the mountains all the way. Mt Barker was still watching us (pictured above).

Discovery Passage

Today was the second last day of our trip to V.I. We set off early from our hotel in Parksville & drove 130 kms north to Campbell River. It was a bit last minute but we'd booked ourselves on another whale watching cruise, this time into Discovery Passage. Discovery Passage is the narrowest section of water between V.I. & the mainland. There's a myriad of islands in the area as well. It was what I had actually come to V.I. for. The whales were always going to be a bonus. The scenery was awesome. There were no tourists to bug us, just the local wildlife.

The narrow waterway causes some extreme water movement. The tides run strong and boaties need to take great care in this treacherous stretch of water.

We hadn't even left the harbour at Campbell River before we'd seen our first Bald Eagle. Not far north of there, on Quadra Island, we spotted this pair in the tree. They looked very well fed & considering the abundance of salmon in the area, it wasn't exactly a ground breaking discovery. As we continued north, we saw many pairs perched in the trees scoping the water for fish. The Bald Eagles are easy to spot among the dark green spruce trees because they look like golf balls from a distance. Their white heads give them away. It's a big call, but I think we saw more bald eagles today than we did the whole time we were in Alaska, and there were heaps up there.

One of the other residents of Quadra Island is the Black Tailed deer. These are similar to the white tails on the mainland, but are endemic to Vancouver Island & some of the smaller islands in Discovery passage. They are much smaller than their mainland cousins. Bambi's mum in picture only stands about 3 ft at the shoulder. Their white tailed cousins are nearly double that full grown. Unfortunately for the deer, they are a prime snack for the many predators, particularly on Quadra Island. (You can see the doe looking up the hill for danger which was apparently more of a threat than us in the boat). Anything from eagles to wolves & cougars think that even the adults make great eating. The deer still seem to thrive.

Unfortunately the wind was blowing 30 knots plus by the time we weren't too far north. It made it nearly impossible to spot the orcas we had come to find. We could have driven right past them & not know it because of the white caps & spray. We persisted to a point but eventually when Discovery Passage changed into Johnstone Strait, the captain decided it wasn't worth the punishment or the risk to go any further. Instead we headed into a small port on the mainland called Port Neville. It's basically just a wharf, a post office & a bit of a museum. You'll notice an aluminium boat next to the wharf. That was our boat. It's kind of funny looking, but it really did a good job. We didn't get wet, we didn't get beaten up & it was deceptively quick!

We took a break from the battering in the boat & had a look around the old post office. Lorna, the lady who runs the post office, showed us around & was nice enough to tell us about the history of the place. It's now a mail hub for people living in the surrounding area on islands or inlets. The mail float plane comes 3 times a week (now that would be a cool mail run). After a spot of lunch we hopped back on the boat & headed back toward Campbell River.

Due to the lack of opportunity to spot whales, the back up plan was to go bear hunting. We saw three yesterday and were excited about seeing a few more and having an opportunity to catch them with the camera. We were in luck. The bears don't seem at all interested in boats & just go about their business normally. We ended up seeing 3 of them on the way back. They were all foraging on the shore, turning over rocks looking for various snacks.

The good thing about being in a boat is that you can get really close to the animals without disturbing them or having them attack you. Something to notice about the coastal black bears is that they are completely black. Their Albertan cousins we've seen usually have a brown face & a few white markings. As you can see, that's not the case with these guys.

The return trip to Campbell river was much more sedate. Aside from the frequent stops for wildlife, we were protected from the wind. We took a route between the islands closer to the mainland through some calmer waters & some spectacular scenery. The only unfinished business I have on V.I. is in the same area. In September & October you can take a trip with the same company (Discovery Marine Tours) across to an inlet on the mainland where the salmon run. The grizzlies line up, sometimes 15 at a time & fish for salmon. It will just give us an excuse to come back some other time.......

Tofino & Waterfalls

Tofino

From today we going to explore the middle of Vancouver Island. We'll be based at Quaillicum Beach for a couple of nights so we can do a couple of day trips to explore our surroundings. Our exploration today took us to Tofino on the remote west coast. From Quallicum Beach there's a 170km narrow windy hacked up road to negotiate to cross the island. The drive took us 2-1/2 hours! Just before we reached Tofio township we passed through this dense forest. This is about the best photo we have of coastal rain forest typical of the western shore of VI. The trees here aren't as tall as the ones we saw near Victoria 2 days ago, but are still very impressive.

Canadians have a huge coastline but very few places where they can surf. The north is frozen most of the year & the Atlantic Ocean is bitterly cold.
Long Beach near Tofino is the best known surfing beach in Canada (pictured is Chesterman Beach next door). I don't see the attraction myself. The water, even in the middle of summer is still icy.
There wasn't much in the way of surf today & the fog was thick & cold. We may well have been there on a quiet day surf wise. I could see the potential for great waves on the right day but I think I'll stick to the surf back home. The crazies were still out in the water regardless of how inviting the weather was.

We saw lots of black bears along the road across the island but there was nowhere to pull over safely to take any photos.

Quallicum Falls

On the way back from Tofino we took a divert to a couple of the provincial parks close to Parksville. The first one was Quallicum falls. A short walk took us to Upper Quallicum Falls (above). There was also a smaller unnamed water fall at the foot of the Upper Falls (below).

There was also another waterfall close by called <wait for it> Lower Quallicum Falls (below).

 

Englishman Falls

A short drive from Quallicum Falls is Englishman falls. Once again there was an Upper Falls (above & below) & a Lower Falls.

The Upper falls is one of the most unusual waterfalls I have ever seen. It topples down into a seemingly endless crack in the earth and disappears.

The lower falls (above) are a bit more conventional despite being a twin fall. It is slightly ironic that we drove for 5 hours to Tofino today but the pick of the scenery was 15 mins from our base at Quallicum Beach.

Mount Douglas & Craigdarroch Castle

Another thing you can do around Victoria is drive along the coastline & then up to the Mt Douglas Lookout. It's a great vantage point for overlooking Victoria & over to mainland US & Canada. The drive along the coast in nice, but nothing that spectacular. It is difficult to impress an Aussie with a coastline.

 We were able to look north and see where we'll be driving to tomorrow. We're off to Qualicum Beach, half way up Vancouver Island.

Across the water to the South East we could see mainland Washington State with Mt Barker watching us once again.

This is another of Victoria's overrated tourist attractions, Craigdarroch Castle. Sure it's a castle, but having been to Europe & the UK, this one is just a little cottage that isn't that old. We took the photo from out front & didn't bother going in. The write-ups hadn't inspired us at all.

South West Vancouver Island

Today we ventured out from Victoria and completed a lap of the south west of Vancouver Island. We followed the coastal road to Port Renfrew then went inland to Cowichan Lake & back to Vancouver along Hwy 1 that runs along the east coast.
The drive along the south west coast is quite an interesting drive. The road winds though a lush old growth rain forest with huge cedar trees. It was really hard to take good photos of due to the lack of places to pull over and the lack of light because the forest is so dense. Many rave about Cathedral Grove to the north but it's only a very small little pocket of forest. The south west coastal forest runs for some 50kms. It's more or less devoid of tourists which is always a good thing. We did a short hike around the small peninsular at Port Renfrew called the Botanical Loop. Above is the first point of interest you come to. It's called Botany Bay. It doesn't look anything like the Botany Bay I know in Australia.

You may have noticed in the first photo, a solid coverage of low cloud. The western coast of Vancouver Island (and apparently the North American west coast) tends to be covered in fog most of the time before 11am. Today was no exception. Then all of a sudden, the fog lifted and the sun made an appearance. It's amazing what a difference it made in such a short amount of time. If you look close enough, you'll see the Washington State coast across that water. I was impressed by the shear cliff sculptured by abuse from the wind and waves. Its about 8m high. Nature still manages to cling on despite the weather conditions. The trees are clustered tight right up to the edge of the overhang of the cliff.

Port Renfrew is nothing more than a jetty and a hotel (well not quite, but close). We walked along the jetty being the nosey tourists we are and saw this shifty character up one of the trees. The inland part of the "Circle Route" as it's called, was interesting enough without being spectacular. Logging on the island is big business and most of the island is scarred with patches of tree stumps. Much of the rest of the journey was tree stump scenery. The lakes on the island are nowhere near as pretty as those in the Rockies. Cowichan Lake wasn't even worth taking a photo of.

Orcas & Butchart Gardens

Fisherman's Wharf

Fisherman's Wharf is just around the Inner Harbour from the main tourist part. There are a whole bunch of odd little house boats that actually look more like houses than boats. Be assured they all have a motor of some type or other, but I wouldn't think you would want to drive them around in anything too rough. Some of them are even shops of varying types from ice cream shops to art galleries.

Whale watching

This is the way to go whale watching. Take a scarab hull & bolt three 250hp 4-stroke outboards to the back & you've got a brilliant way of getting places in a real hurry!
Eagle Wing Tours only have two boats & ours was the smaller of the two. All the other whale watching operators have either big slow cruisers or Zodiacs which are fast but if the weather's even slightly wind, you get soaked! We made a good choice because we stayed dry, didn't get beaten up by the rough seas & smoked the Zodiacs on the way back.

I'd Like to introduce you to L74. He's a male orca of "L-Pod". L-Pod are one of the "Resident" families that live around Vancouver Island. L74 is about 22 years old. All the whales are studied & given a name (of sorts). They can be easily recognised by the experts by their dorsal fin & the markings on their backs. As you can see from the photo, the orcas are not given much peace. They are surrounded by tourist operators on a daily basis. It's a bit disturbing really.

This female orca is called L12. L12 was born in 1933. She's one of the oldest of her pod. There's a web site that has all the info for identifying the individuals including family trees. L12 & L74 were traveling together when we were there. There were a number of other members of L-Pod we saw that day, but they were a way off & hounded by other boats. Some of the other cruise operators aren't very good at obeying the rules about staying at least 100m from the animals.

Among about 70 photos I took today, about six were good. This one was the best of the lot. The whales were on a serious mission to get wherever they were going & were surfacing only briefly. At one point they were chasing a school of salmon, but otherwise weren't doing anything particularly interesting. L74 got all excited for just a little while & started breaching. He only did it about 4 times & I managed to catch him in the act once.

On the return journey from the whale watching, the captain took us to a favourite hang out for some of the local Harbour Seals. They are the same species as the ones we saw in Alaska & just as lazy! The difference here was the lack of rain.

Everywhere we went chasing the whales, Mt Barker seemed to be watching over us. It towers over the surrounding peaks that are substantial themselves.

Butchart Gardens

 A short drive north of Victoria is the Butchart Gardens. "Gardens" I hear you say. Why would you go there? Well believe it or not, if you get a chance to go to Vancouver Island, this is one of the must see attractions on the list.Above, the Sunken Garden, is one of the many theme gardens within the Butchart Gardens complex.

It is the middle of summer and the flowers in the garden are in full bloom much like their wild cousins we saw in the mountains last week.

This is Ross Fountain. It has a similar fancy water jet display to the Bellagio in Las Vegas.

More flowers.....

And more with the obsession with totem poles! I couldn't help but act the goose.

This is another of the theme gardens in Butchart Gardens. The Japanese garden is one of the better ones.

Like I said, a must see if you visit Victoria B.C.

Victoria Inner Harbour.

This evening we had dinner and wandered around the Inner Harbour enjoying the twilight and taking a few photos. I'll let the photos themselves speak for me.

It was a very rewarding day and it will to be a tough one to top.