TOFINO SEA KAYAKING PART 2!

When we started paddling on our third day, we thought that the day would bring rain. We paddled between some small islands near the shore. As we found some calmer water, we looked up and saw....
SEA OTTERS!


A momma and her cubs! The one baby had sea weed hanging out of his mouth.


We stopped for a little break, this time looking down and seeing....JELLY FISH (Baye's underwater camera amazed us all yet again)

Incredible!

However, when we were crossing from one island to the next, the clouds started to part.


I could finally bring my camera out on the water. Carefully of course, don't worry Dad. The kayakers that made this trip possible!!


The mountains were so beautiful in the background!

You can see where we came from!

Baye and Charlie sang "99 bottles of beer on the wall" down to zero!

We stopped for lunch at my favourite beach beach of the trip. The shore line consisted of many small broken shells instead of sand or rocks.

We hung up all of our wet clothes, hoping that they would dry during lunch in case it rained again.


Then we got ready for our lunch! Cookies, tuna, pepperoni, fruit veggies, etc!


We all pretended to wait patiently while lunch was prepared. 

I had to distract myself by taking pictures.

And collected shells to make earrings out of.

After lunch, nobody wanted to leave our beautiful, sunny beach.

However, the tide was rising. (We kayaked through the place you see the person walking across in the background)




So we packed up quickly, put on some sunscreen, collected the clothes that Charlie forgot and headed out for more adventures.
We saw a few more whales and whale watching boats.


But mostly the seaweed caught our attention.


I mean... very distracted.

We didn't even need out paddling jackets after a while. We could roll up our sleeves and really enjoy the water.
All thoughts of the R word, were pushed from out minds. (meaning these R(ainy) thoughts...)

We stopped at a beautiful beach for the night. We landed our kayaks, pushed them across the small pond, unloaded them and carried them away from the rising tide. 

We were afraid to listen to the radio, in case it gave us bad news.

But it stayed beautiful. 

Our clothes dried, our tents were set up and a game of ultimate was on the agenda. But of course, make sure you stretch first. Our games get intense! 

As we were making ourselves comfortable, we realized that we were not alone in the forest. There had been other creatures there before us.... WOLVES. Their prints were new and surrounded the entire beach. 

SCARY! We went to explore and when we were walking back to the camp, we smelled a PUTRID smell, which Kevin thought was me of course. We looked to our right and saw a huge carcass. After running away trying not to upchuck valuable food, we came back to investigate. We realized that it was a sea lion carcass. It's vertebrae were huge... but I will say no more. 

After our activities we ran through the pond, into the ocean to wash off the sand and cool off! 

UH OH!

YAY!

We quickly learned why the beach was called, Medallion Beach. I have always wanted to find a sand dollar on a beach. One that is perfect and beautiful. I couldn't believe it when we found numerous sand dollars on the beach. I had many to chose from to bring home! 

After our activities, we got ready for dinner and enjoyed the scenery! 

"Kev, I know we have to conserve food, but my stomach doesn't like that idea." -Probably my thought at this point

But we never did go hungry. We had our gorp bags to keep us happy- good ol' peanuts and raisins as Baye would say.

Charlie- Always our little kitchen helper.

Kevin already has his head lamp ready.... (not scared of the wolves at all)

We went to bed, hoping for sun the next day and trying not to think that our trip was coming to a close and...

WE LIVED THROUGH THE NIGHT and woke up to a beautiful morning. 

We packed up our belongings and jumped in the kayaks for the last time. Not before a group picture though. I love the 10second timer.

And I love this group of people!

I miss Tofino. It was like a dream that I didn't want to end. 

We arrived back at the docks after a morning of paddling. We unloaded the kayaks, rinsed them out and headed back for a few much needed showers. 

Kevin, Charlie and I walked along the beach while we waited for a ride to lunch. 

Canada never ceases to amaze me. 

Next stop- The Fish Taco Bus! We put in a huge order and waited for our meals.

We tried to wait patiently, but we aren't the most functional group when we are hungry.

But finally everything came and we were not disappointed!

After an amazing lunch, everyone parted ways and headed back to their designated places.
Taylor and Alison headed back to Victoria with Alison's parents.
Baye, Charlie, Matt, Shelagh and Reid dropped us off at the airport and made the long drive back to Whistler.

Kevin and I headed to the Tofino airport to start our treck back to Canmore. The flight was beautiful!!

I tried my hardest to stay awake the entire time!

I was so sad when we left everyone, knowing that the trip we all looked forward to so much was over.

However, we knew that we were heading back to whistler again shortly.

Tofino was incredible! We saw more marine life than I have ever seen in my life, while being cautious of wolves and bears. We smiled a lot, sang often and laughed even more. It was one of the most incredible experiences of my life!
We used my friend's quote a lot of the journey, "There is no bad weather, only bad clothing!"