TOFINO! SEA KAYAKING!
This makes me excited again just writing this. For the Canada Day weekend, Kevin's parents took their family plus some to TOFINO for a SEA KAYAKING trip!!!
The organizer (Shelagh, Kevin's Mom)
The most extreme ultimate Frisbee player. (Reid, Kevin's Dad)
The dancer or octopus (Taylor, Kevin's brother)
The teacher of games (Alison, Taylor's girlfriend)
The second sister (Baye, Kevin's sister)
"Cha-lee, you so strong." (Charlie, Kevin's cousin)
Our guide, Matt
My kayak partner (Kevin)
And Me!!! On my first true vacation!
Kevin and I rushed to the airport and took a flight to Vancouver. Then we met Taylor and Alison and took a small airplane to Tofino. I will put pictures from the plane in the next post!
That night we stayed in Tofino, ate burgers and packed. When I say packed I mean to say that Shelagh gave us what we needed and gave us hints (or the answers) about what to bring. Finally, we each had two 20L drybags (for our nighttime clothes) and one 10L bag for what we needed during the day. These bags had to include toilet paper, head lamps, snacks, sunglasses, warm hat, baseball cap, etc.
Thus, the car looked like this, with nine of us packed into it.
We heard the rain coming down like never before throughout the night, but it held off in the morning!
The boys warmed up there legs to.... actually I'm not sure why.
Kevin made peace with the wild life right away.
We had a busy morning of packing. We had to take the bags from the car to a tarp by the water, far from the rising tide.
Then we shuttled down the kayaks. We paddled in two person sea kayaks!
Clothes, tents, food and more!
The clouds didn't offer much sunshine, but the views were still incredible.
Baye and I were almost too excited to pack!
We had just started paddling when we saw these figures in the distance.
We came closer and saw these two...
I had never seen eagles! They are huge!
Amazing!
As was the kelp, which turned into kelp grenades shortly after this picture was taken. The seaweed leaves were attached to a ball and then attached to a stem. Well the ball obviously became a type of weapon for the boys. As if we weren't wet enough!
We stopped for lunch on a little beach.
It had rained a bit along the way, so we hung everything under the tree coverage to dry.
And the games of Frisbee began. It began as a game of catch, but as the days progressed it turned into the most extreme games of ultimate Frisbee, of which Reid dove the hardest!
We forgot to do the rain dance...
We kayaked quickly from one island to another. It was incredible. I have never kayaked on the open ocean.
The waves were rolling and at about 2-2.5m tall at the highest point. Our boats were sturdy and we decided to try to surf the waves a little bit!
We decided to set up camp early at Cow Bay. Our guide, Matt, told us to watch for boomer, which are rocks that are covered in water, but make the waves break over them. Apparently these are a kayaker's worst nightmare. As we were heading in to our landing sight, we were paddling between two breakers, all of a sudden someone yelled look. We took a second to look up and saw a huge whale to the left of us. It was so close that we could see it's eye and most of it's body when it came up for air.
Eventually, we arrived at our home for the next two nights, safe and sound.
The beach was beautiful!
A sunstar was in the little pond to great us.
The clouds eventually parted. We unloaded the kayaks,
set up the tents, set up the kitchen and played an epic game of ultimate Frisbee.
Right beside the ocean.
Since it was dry, I went camera crazy for a while.
We couldn't contain our excitement.
Our kitchen, living room, game area and warming station.
We had amazing dinner of steak and potatoes. Always acting very classy with our plastic wine glasses.
We went exploring...
Shared some hugs...
Enjoyed our new home
and were pensive in our scenery, thinking about why we all love Canada.
The next day we slept in, ate pancakes and headed out for a day of paddling. We decided that we would stay one more night in Cow's Bay because the weather didn't look great. As we drank our coffee and collected dry firewood to store under the tarp.
Matt told us that he kept seeing the spray from the blowhole of whales. That paired with our decision to stay one more night meant.... WHALE WATCHING!!
The whales seemed to love us. We spoke to them in our best whale accents....
and hoped for the best. We all stayed together and stayed quiet, which was tough for our group. The whales seemed to surround us. We could see the barnacles on the back of the whales, along with the two holes on top. The whales were huge, however the air that they blow out smells putrid. It is a mix of bad fish, salt, sulfur and something else I can't put my finger on.... in other words, awful! As we were leaving one whale came up about 25ft from our kayak!!! Have I mentioned how amazing the weekend was?!
It poured rain for most of the day and it grew cold. We stopped for lunch at this amazing cabin at the top of a rocky face.
We were able to get out of our wet clothes and warm up a little bit. The view was amazing! A man built this cabin and squatted on this piece of land for years. He passed away, but his cabin was passed on to adventurers like us.
Everything was built out of wood...
the doorknob...
a bench.
He must have been at peace with nature.
My girls, I remember deliberately trying to stand on higher ground.... fail.
My boys!
We were very cold after lunch and decided to head straight back to our campsite. We paddled between rocks, in between boomers, through the rain and arrived home.
Thank goodness we collected that wood in the morning!
While we put on warm clothes and started a fire, while the boys tried to surf their kayaks.
When they came in, everyone was thankful there was a fire. At first the rain didn't both anyone, thanks to Shelagh's packing, however eventually we were all a little tired of the downpour. We put on all of our warm clothes, played cards and hoped for the best!
In the morning, we woke up early and it had stopped raining! I had time for a few pictures.
Then we got ready quickly to move to a new campsite!
Everyone was very happy that it was dry. Especially my fingers which had been pruney for almost 24h.
We were leaving our beautiful sandy beach.
I may have gone home with some of that sand in my stomach from eating so much of it.
But I still loved it... and I miss it!
Then we pushed off and headed out onto the water again.
That day was better than I ever could have dreamed of! More on that soon! I will give you a teaser: The clouds parted!! Stay posted for more on our Sea Kayak adventure... featuring le soleil, wolves, sea otters and much more!
*These pictures are a collaboration from Baye, Shelagh and myself.
The organizer (Shelagh, Kevin's Mom)
The most extreme ultimate Frisbee player. (Reid, Kevin's Dad)
The dancer or octopus (Taylor, Kevin's brother)
The teacher of games (Alison, Taylor's girlfriend)
The second sister (Baye, Kevin's sister)
"Cha-lee, you so strong." (Charlie, Kevin's cousin)
Our guide, Matt
My kayak partner (Kevin)
And Me!!! On my first true vacation!
Kevin and I rushed to the airport and took a flight to Vancouver. Then we met Taylor and Alison and took a small airplane to Tofino. I will put pictures from the plane in the next post!
That night we stayed in Tofino, ate burgers and packed. When I say packed I mean to say that Shelagh gave us what we needed and gave us hints (or the answers) about what to bring. Finally, we each had two 20L drybags (for our nighttime clothes) and one 10L bag for what we needed during the day. These bags had to include toilet paper, head lamps, snacks, sunglasses, warm hat, baseball cap, etc.
Thus, the car looked like this, with nine of us packed into it.
We heard the rain coming down like never before throughout the night, but it held off in the morning!
The boys warmed up there legs to.... actually I'm not sure why.
Kevin made peace with the wild life right away.
We had a busy morning of packing. We had to take the bags from the car to a tarp by the water, far from the rising tide.
Then we shuttled down the kayaks. We paddled in two person sea kayaks!
Clothes, tents, food and more!
The clouds didn't offer much sunshine, but the views were still incredible.
Baye and I were almost too excited to pack!
We came closer and saw these two...
I had never seen eagles! They are huge!
Amazing!
As was the kelp, which turned into kelp grenades shortly after this picture was taken. The seaweed leaves were attached to a ball and then attached to a stem. Well the ball obviously became a type of weapon for the boys. As if we weren't wet enough!
We stopped for lunch on a little beach.
It had rained a bit along the way, so we hung everything under the tree coverage to dry.
And the games of Frisbee began. It began as a game of catch, but as the days progressed it turned into the most extreme games of ultimate Frisbee, of which Reid dove the hardest!
We forgot to do the rain dance...
We kayaked quickly from one island to another. It was incredible. I have never kayaked on the open ocean.
The waves were rolling and at about 2-2.5m tall at the highest point. Our boats were sturdy and we decided to try to surf the waves a little bit!
We decided to set up camp early at Cow Bay. Our guide, Matt, told us to watch for boomer, which are rocks that are covered in water, but make the waves break over them. Apparently these are a kayaker's worst nightmare. As we were heading in to our landing sight, we were paddling between two breakers, all of a sudden someone yelled look. We took a second to look up and saw a huge whale to the left of us. It was so close that we could see it's eye and most of it's body when it came up for air.
Eventually, we arrived at our home for the next two nights, safe and sound.
The beach was beautiful!
A sunstar was in the little pond to great us.
The clouds eventually parted. We unloaded the kayaks,
set up the tents, set up the kitchen and played an epic game of ultimate Frisbee.
Right beside the ocean.
Since it was dry, I went camera crazy for a while.
We couldn't contain our excitement.
Our kitchen, living room, game area and warming station.
We had amazing dinner of steak and potatoes. Always acting very classy with our plastic wine glasses.
We went exploring...
Shared some hugs...
Enjoyed our new home
and were pensive in our scenery, thinking about why we all love Canada.
The next day we slept in, ate pancakes and headed out for a day of paddling. We decided that we would stay one more night in Cow's Bay because the weather didn't look great. As we drank our coffee and collected dry firewood to store under the tarp.
Matt told us that he kept seeing the spray from the blowhole of whales. That paired with our decision to stay one more night meant.... WHALE WATCHING!!
The whales seemed to love us. We spoke to them in our best whale accents....
and hoped for the best. We all stayed together and stayed quiet, which was tough for our group. The whales seemed to surround us. We could see the barnacles on the back of the whales, along with the two holes on top. The whales were huge, however the air that they blow out smells putrid. It is a mix of bad fish, salt, sulfur and something else I can't put my finger on.... in other words, awful! As we were leaving one whale came up about 25ft from our kayak!!! Have I mentioned how amazing the weekend was?!
It poured rain for most of the day and it grew cold. We stopped for lunch at this amazing cabin at the top of a rocky face.
We were able to get out of our wet clothes and warm up a little bit. The view was amazing! A man built this cabin and squatted on this piece of land for years. He passed away, but his cabin was passed on to adventurers like us.
Everything was built out of wood...
the doorknob...
a bench.
He must have been at peace with nature.
My girls, I remember deliberately trying to stand on higher ground.... fail.
My boys!
We were very cold after lunch and decided to head straight back to our campsite. We paddled between rocks, in between boomers, through the rain and arrived home.
Thank goodness we collected that wood in the morning!
While we put on warm clothes and started a fire, while the boys tried to surf their kayaks.
When they came in, everyone was thankful there was a fire. At first the rain didn't both anyone, thanks to Shelagh's packing, however eventually we were all a little tired of the downpour. We put on all of our warm clothes, played cards and hoped for the best!
In the morning, we woke up early and it had stopped raining! I had time for a few pictures.
Then we got ready quickly to move to a new campsite!
Everyone was very happy that it was dry. Especially my fingers which had been pruney for almost 24h.
We were leaving our beautiful sandy beach.
I may have gone home with some of that sand in my stomach from eating so much of it.
But I still loved it... and I miss it!
Then we pushed off and headed out onto the water again.
That day was better than I ever could have dreamed of! More on that soon! I will give you a teaser: The clouds parted!! Stay posted for more on our Sea Kayak adventure... featuring le soleil, wolves, sea otters and much more!
*These pictures are a collaboration from Baye, Shelagh and myself.
Oh my gosh, Erin! This trip looked amazing... gorgeous pictures too. I can only imagine how much fun you guys had. Kind of makes me miss my canoe tripping days! What a cool experience
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