On the Boardwalks

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We know it's incredibly wasteful of energy but we wanted to sleep to the sound of the ocean, so we left the porch door open with the fireplace running all night. It was amazing waking up to the morning chill next to the fire. Even more amazing was drinking my cup of coffee on said porch with my hotel binoculars, spying on sea otters eating breakfast.

Our Storm Watching package came with breakfast the first two mornings (our third night wasn't part of the package but we didn't need breakfast that last morning since we were leaving so early anyway). We could either eat at the Driftwood Cafe or the Pointe Restaurant. We chose the Pointe because of the amazing views from its dining room. We found out quickly this trip that the town was practically void of tourists. Apparently this was a slow week since it was so close to the holidays. So everywhere we went, we were the only or one of the few tourists. We and two other tables had the restaurant to ourselves. It was still cloudy that morning. Our waiter served us fresh juice while Chris fiddled with a camera he borrowed from a co-worker. It ended up being so drizzly that he never used the camera, for fear of damaging it since it wasn't his. My food looked beautiful when it arrived. My plate of butternut squash tarts were full of color.

After breakfast, we picked up our packed lunch from the front desk. They offer a picnic packing service. The night before you write your order on a slip of paper and leave it outside your room door. Then they provide sandwiches, trail mix, energy bars, fruit and water in a backpack. You can even add things like bottles of wine with wine glasses. We actually planned to hike, so we didn't include wine in ours. We changed into our warm layered hiking clothes and brought along the complimentary rain slickers the hotel provides for every guest.

Our first hike of the day was out in Ucluelet, the next town south, about 20min away. We decided to walk the Lighthouse Loop of the Wild Pacific Trail. Seriously, there were way too many trails to choose from, and not nearly enough time to pack them all in. This loop probably took us an hour and a half in total. It started out raining, and kept alternating between rain, clouds and sun. It wasn't crazy windy, though, so there weren't huge ocean swells sadly. The loop took us along the rocky coast towards a lighthouse. Shortly thereafter, we ran into a man dressed like a serious hiker rather than a tourist. He excitedly pointed out a roosting eagle to us. He wanted to know where we were from and was stoked to find out we were from the Bay Area in California. Pretty much his life was slowly creeping north along the west coast, starting in San Diego, to Point Reyes, Yosemite, Seattle, Tofino, working as a park ranger and other wildlife type jobs. We spent a solid fifteen minutes swapping outdoors adventure stories. Then we parted ways and finished the hike. Probably the most interesting part of this hike were the crazy, twisty trees close to the water. Without any protection, they get pounded by winter storms into insane shapes.

After our hike, we drove to the next stop, the Rainforest Loop Trail. One of the loops was closed, and I believe the open loop was Loop B. It was definitely the loop that was closer to the ocean. Before hiking, we decided to eat our lunch. Or as much as we could. There was seriously too much food. I had ordered an amazing smoked salmon sandwich. I can't remember what Chris had but he enjoyed his as well. I also munched on one of the chocolate dipped energy bars in the back of the car. The hatchback made a perfect sitting area.

There's something incredibly attractive about redwood boardwalks in the wet forest. I was in heaven. I kept stopping repeatedly on the 2km walk to take pictures. The loop took us downhill on a series of wooden stairs and boardwalks and then headed back up again. We saw another enormous twisty tree that was crazy to look at. I don't think my photo does it justice. I can't even imagine the storms that tree must have seen.

After this hike it was already early afternoon. We only got about 8 hours of daylight this far north unfortunately, but I wanted to keep hiking! I also wanted to check out the downtown. We had dinner reservations at 5pm but we guessed that it probably wouldn't be a huge issue for the hotel to push it back an hour. We were right. So we had coffee and a tofino bar (I have no idea what's in it other than chocolate and not chocolate but it was amazing; supposed to be the Tofino challenge to the Nanaimo bar) at a local cafe called the Common Loaf Bake Shop. My coffee was on par with the awesome coffee I had in Japan earlier this year. I'm beginning to think that Americans just suck at coffee in general.

Then we headed back out for one last hike before the sun disappeared- the Schooner Cove Trail down to Schooners Beach, which can be walked when the tide is out. We had saved this hike for last just for that reason. We headed down the 2km trail along more redwood boardwalks and stairs. It was mostly a descent down to the beach. We passed by a beautiful set of roots from a tree that had intricately grown over a fallen log. So pretty. Once at the beach, we came across a warning sign about being crushed by moving logs. Holy crap. This beach isn't kidding around. It was very calm but rainy when we got there. The tide was out as we had planned, and we were able to walk pretty far on wet sand. I was mildly worried about quicksand- I'd heard horror stories from an old coworker who badly injured herself on beach quicksand- but we didn't encounter any. We saw crazy rain clouds in the distance, and poked around tidepools. I love poking the squishy sea anenomes. I found some rather giant ones, even. I didn't poke those- I was kinda worried I'd lose a hand. We kept walking along the beach and saw some driftwood shelters people had built. After that, it was time to head back before it got too dark. It was ruggedly beautiful out there.

We got back to the hotel room, and I did some more serious soaking in the hot tub with Chris. It was incredibly relaxing after hiking in the cold wet weather all day. Then we got dressed and headed downstairs to The Pointe for our dinner reservation. I was super excited about eating here. I normally take pictures of the food I eat but since the restaurant wasn't very busy and there were several dishes, I didn't want the staff to notice me. So I just skipped it for once. Let's just say I went with the Chef's Tasting Menu complete with Wine Pairings, and course after course I was not disappointed. We were at that meal for three hours but it was so good it didn't feel that way. After dinner, we headed back upstairs to watch tv and then sleep.

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Comments

[D MJ Binkley]

Amazing scenery
Nice shot.