ace4.org Vancouver Island, British Columbia
main squamish vancouver island olympic national park st helens rainier


View off the road from Nanaimo to Victoria, probably of Sidney The Empress Hotel, a massive, old, and expensive hotel in Victoria Seaplanes took off and landed right in the harbor, flying tours of the area as well as passengers to other towns on the island, and even to Seattle


The big blue boat is the Concordia, which holds the Semester at Sea program, where college students take an entire semester sailing to places around the world In the pacific northwest, apparently you can't have a beach without having tons of driftwood. Literally, many tons. Entire dead trees, from the roots to the tips were lying on beaches sometimes. Jon is standing on one of the trees to give some scale.


Both of the beach pictures were from a beach near Port Renfrew, which is a really small town on the west coast of the island The trail to Botanical Beach, part of Juan de Fuca Provincial Park, lots of red alder trees Botanical Beach, which usually has a lot of tidal pool life, except when the tide is approaching high, which is when we got there


Waves crashing on Botanical Beach Botany Bay, nearby to Botanical Beach The banana slugs get really big in the area, the penny is to give some scale


Looking out over the Juan de Fuca Strait, a sea of fog, towards Washington state and the Olympic Mountains Another view, with much less fog, farther east on the island Whale watching is a big business from Victoria, particularly Orca (killer whale) watching. The place takes you out on a zodiac towards San Juan Island in the Strait of Georgia to see them. This was one popping its head up to look around on the surface.


Jumping Pretending they're Jaws Waving to the boat


More looking around More jumping A sailboat race left Victoria harbor to circle Vancouver Island the day we left on the ferry to Washington


                


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