An Adventure Vacation Adds Spice to Your Life!

An Vancouver Island vacation gets you close to nature and refreshes the soul. We'll help you pick the real gems from the ecotourism travel listings. We focus on how to find the best activities, what to expect, what to wear, what to bring and sometime more importantly what not to bring.

We believe that preserving the natural environment for future generations is important so we grade vacation travel operators for their environmental stewardship.

A Yearly Teak

Both my wife and I were born in Atlantic Canada. In 1970 we moved to Alberta to attend university. For the next 14 years we made a yearly summer streak to visit Vancouver Island.

In 1984 we moved to Vancouver Island and since that time have toured it extensively.

We have tried all the activities that we recommend on this site and are sure that the tour operators will treat you well and make your stay a memorable one.

Wherever we go we take the digital camera so you can get an idea of what you might see on an adventure vaction to Vancouver Island.

We realize that the term adventure means different things to each traveler. If you are a parent with young children, just getting through the day without major incidents can be an trial.

With this in mind we point out age, size and physical condition limitations for all the adventure vacation links you will find on this site.

Our Feature Photo Gallery - Ocean Kayaking

Prep for Multi-Day Kayak Trip
1. The preparation for an adventure vacation kayak trip started here in the pool room with organization and packing of the dry food. I will give you a couple of tips on how we did it.
The Francis Barkley Ship
2. To get to the Broken Islands we choose to book passage on the Francis Barkley out of Port Alberni. The boat dropped us at Sechart where our rented kayaks were waiting.
Container Holding Our Food and Water
3. All of our dry food and water are shown in this shot. The little four liter collapsible containers were a big winner. The blue 10 liter jug was more of a pain in the you know where.
Humpback Whale in Alberni Inlet
4. Along the way we were fortunate to see some of the resident humped back whales that inhabit the area. We had several close encounters with these huge mammals while in the kayaks but conditions were not right for picture taking.
Broken Islands Park Ranger Orientation
5. After reaching Sechart one of the park ranges gave a bit of an orientation to what we could expect on our adventure vacation in the Broken Islands.
Hand Island - Broken Islands Group
6. This shot was taken on Hand Island. It has several excellent beaches and one of the eight camping sites. This is an idyllic spot to stop for lunch or to camp.
Bald Eagle - High in Tree
7. During our trip I have several encounters with bald eagles. This is one of the many birds we saw. These majestic birds are always a treat to photograph.
Starfish Underwater
8. At low tide there are lots of rocky beaches that are great for viewing inter-tidal creatures. Here you are looking at an upside down star fish.
Starfish Underwater-2
8.5 Here is another star fish shown slightly under water at low tide.
Young Deer Grazing
9. On many of the islands the deer are plentiful. This picture of a young fawn was shot on Clark island in front of the old fire place still standing from a dismantled dwelling.
Broken Islands Sunset
10. The setting of the sun in the North West is always a beautiful event. This shot was taken from our adventure vacation base camp on Willis island.
Instructions For Using This Photo Gallery
Click on one of the thumbnail photos to enlarge the image and read the descriptive message. The blank white square with the yellow border covers the thumbnail of the current photo.

About This Photo Gallery

The pictures in this gallery will change from time to time as I capture new vistas that I want to share with you.

Click on each of the thumbnail images, in the block to the right of the main picture. This will cause the main image to be replaced with the thumbnail you have chosen. A caption is shown in the bottom right of the gallery box and gives information regarding the shot.

We have been extra busy this summer checking out a number of opportunities that you might want to try on an adventure vacation to Vancouver Island. Currently the photo gallery holds shots of our recent kayak trip to the Broken Group Islands in the Long Beach National Park. Enjoy.

The pictures here are protected under copyright and are strictly for your viewing enjoyment. Please see our Terms of Use section for more details.

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Contact: Don Cowper