August 2001
Johnstone Straight is just North of Vancouver Island in British Columbia - it's
an incredibly beautiful place where I spent six days sea kayaking with a group
of five other people, one of whom is Neel Sarkar, a good friend of mine from
Austin.
I arrived in Vancouver a day early, crashed in a youth hostel and met Neel in
the bus terminal the next afternoon. After a six hour bus ride involving
two buses, two ferries, and an island taxi, we arrived at "The Yum Yum
Tree", had peanuts, beer, and potato chips for dinner, and crashed for the
night.
The next morning we were up at 6 to meet Mike White, our guide, at 7 AM, to
begin the journey. We also met Derek and Emma Mumford, two Canucks from
the Toronto Area, and Steve, a lawyer from Down Under. The six of us
hardly looked like the rugged adventurers or yesteryear with enough REI gear
and day-glo rainwear to shock a monkey.
Our first day, we didn't get into the water until close to 1 PM - the burden
that a group of 6 people comes with it. Mike promised me that I would
enjoy my first guided trip (before, I've always just bought a map and led
myself through the fjords).
I have to admit, there are benefits to having a guide, especially a cooking
guide. Our first night, we had escargot, pate, and grilled salmon.
Amazing. Of course, I've never had pate or escargo before, and pate is on
my list of foods I don't eat due to the way they are made, but I was starving
so my dietary morals buckled and I feasted on cirrhosis-laden goose
liver.
The highlights of the trip included a night of telling jokes around the
campfire (I managed to only offend everyone except for our guide and Neel), a
jump in a hot tub (on a boat owned by the tour company), 60 mosquito bites (15
per arm and leg), around 10 orca sightings, lots of bald eagles and seals, a
waterfall, and making huge fires every night, (the purpose of which was to
"burn some wood"). We Texans were accused of creating foam in
the hot tub, but I'm pretty sure it was the Canadians.
I won't go into detail about the narrow escape from Quadra Island (sort of our
launch point) at the end of the trip, but Neel and I were in kayaks, a van, on
foot, on a ferry, in a taxi, and finally a small plane, all within three hours,
to make it back to Vancouver for our flights out the next morning.
Not having really showered in six days, the Vancouver hotel was unbelievable.
Bryan