Group Therapy

On a map, the Broken Group Islands look like a kelp bed floating in Vancouver Island’s Barkley Sound. But to kayakers, each blob is an intertidal kingdom awaiting discovery 
 
by Kerry McPhedran 
 
The moon is almost full. Each stroke of our paddles lifts and spi lls lime-green stars.We are stardust. No one speaks. 

White talcum-powder beach, turquoise waters – this could be Fiji. Only we’re sun-kipping on tiny island 32, one of the more than 100 islands and islets that make up British Columbia’s world-famous Broken Group off the west coast of Vancouver Island. If there is a sea kayaker’s mecca, this is it. And island 32 is just our lunch stop.

My double-kayak partner, Jennifer, hangs sloth-like, suspended by her pink gumboots and arms off a cantilevered log tossed high by a storm. Guides Natalie and Liz, having packed the leftover guacamole, quesadillas and fruit salad, sprawl in their own sandstone "paradise recliners." Fellow paddlers Nora, Condrea and Stan are beached in the unexpectedly hot September sun in various stages of digestive dozing, hands folded over bellies. Someone burps contentedly.

On the last day of our trip, I’m rerunning a slide show of trip highlights on the back of my eyelids.

Five days ago, we were seven strangers sizing one another up on board the coastal freighter MV Frances Barclay on her three-and-a-half-hour run down the Alberni Inlet to unload kayakers and their gear at historic Sechart. A whaling station in days gone by, Sechart is now the gateway for the Broken Group and week-long guided camping/ kayaking trips with Batstar Adventure Tours.

Batstar appealed to our phalanx of urbanites because of one key phrase on its website’s "Why Choose Batstar" page: "Unplug from the grid." Owners Blake and Rhonda Johnson, who packed up professional careers and two kids in Calgary back in 2001 to follow their passion for kayaking, hiking and biking the west coast, understand that time is everyone’s most valuable asset. Seeing us off on the Frances Barclay that morning, Blake cryptically advised: "Forget the city – go to the Happy Place." We weren’t sure what he meant, but we were willing to look.

Natalie and Liz, hard-core West Coast transplants from Montreal and New Brunswick, expertly loaded a week’s worth of food, drinking water and gear into the single and double Seaward kayaks at Sechart, and our flotilla headed across Sechart Channel to explore the now-protected wild places that make up one third of Canada’s Pacific Rim Park (along with the West Coast Trail and Long Beach). A leisurely hour-and-a-half paddle out of Sechart landed us on the tree-fringed sandy beach of Keith Island – Batstar’s ace in the hole when it comes to competing with the 11 other operators trolling the Broken Group (out of some 60 kayak operators in B.C.). Thanks to the historic 2005 agreement signed by the Johnsons with the Tseshaht Band to train and license Tseshaht youth as sea kayak guides, Batstar guests – never more than eight in a group – have exclusive use of the island as a "no trace" base camp. "There are more than 100 islands in the Broken Group," explained Natalie, "but only eight have designated campsites and competition can be fierce – especially in summer when paddlers arrive from all over the world." Not only private, but protected and central, Keith Island is the ideal paddling-off spot for daytrips to the Broken Group’s Inner and Outer Islands. We feel privileged to share this ancestral village site.

An hour after landing, we’d unloaded the week’s gear, hauled the kayaks above high tide and pitched our tents – the only work Natalie and Liz allowed us all week. Not a potato to be scrubbed, not a dish to be washed. I felt like a free-range kid all over again, with grown-ups who let us wander around if we don’t go too far from home, take us somewhere fun every day, teach us new skills and call us when meals are ready.

When Natalie and Liz aren’t planning the next day’s route, cleaning gear or checking weather on the VHF, they’re rappin’ and cookin’ under the white-and-yellow-striped tarp suspended between trees over a two-burner Coleman on a plank. Using local organic ingredients and "a lot of lovin,’ " they set a folding table with such tasty dishes as curried chicken, basmati rice, wild greens, grilled salmon, even sushi rolls, chocolate cake and fresh-fruit flan. A jar of wildflowers or a sea urchin’s discarded shell decorates our table.

Camp couldn’t be cozier or more comfortable with roomy three-person tents for two, camp chairs around a nightly beach fire and a spotless and discreet cedar outhouse. Montreal-born "Nat" and Liz scamper about like deer shod in bright blue and yellow Holeys, but are amazingly strong, with an easy energy and cheerful friendship that sets the tone: happy campers all.

Each morning we woke to the wild, weird, rattling call of a kingfisher and his blue-winged flash; the smell of freshly brewed organic coffee; French toast and bacon, frittatas and bagels, or pancakes custom-shaped like starfish. At night we sipped wee drams in companionable silence around the campfire and watched sparks fly to the stars. Days ended with Liz handing out hot-out-of-the-pot cloths reminiscent of Japanese restaurants, to wash our hands and face – all part of the Batstar promise of "five-star service, billion-star view."

But our guides’ true competency played out on the water that first day of paddling, when we opted to explore the outer rim of Effingham Island with its 100-metre-high cliffs and paddle through sea arches, only to find we’d slipped from sunshine into an unnerving wall of thick fog. Next landfall, Japan, and the Pacific swell was building. While the Broken Group’s great appeal is its protected waters for first-time paddlers and open ocean for veteran kayakers, the weather can change from calm to storm in less than an hour. I was grateful we were with guides. Natalie herded us into a tight pod and we made for more protected Dicebox, that day’s lunch spot – peering like Mr. Magoo, barely able to see our kayak’s bow let alone an island.

Once home to nine longhouses, Dicebox today draws kayakers to explore on foot the wave-swept cave whose ocean garden floors are thick with starfish, sea urchins and lipstick-pink lichens. The Tseshaht people called this beach A:ts’:a:tsophshil, meaning "when you’re there it’s so beautiful that you don’t want to leave."

I wondered what the Tseshaht called Wower Channel, our afternoon paddle alongside a Steller and California sea lion haulout, where hundreds of giant pinnipeds – what Blake calls "eight-year-old bully boys" – weighing up to 900 kilos, groaned, roared, burped and barked fishy-breathed testosterone. "Don’t make eye contact," I urged Jennifer, paddling in the bow seat.

"Wow! It doesn’t get much better than that," Jennifer called back over her shoulder as we left the bully boys behind and paddled on into Coaster Channel and back toward camp. "Whale at 2 o’clock!" called Stan. A white flash of belly. Nothing. And then the telltale, heart-shaped spout of a 30-tonne great grey, spraying his valentine from two blowholes 12 metres into the sky. Some 25,000 grey whales migrate north to their summer home in Alaska, and the Broken islands lie smack in the middle of their route. Resident whales, like this one, are visible year-round.

Only Day One, and we were definitely off the grid.

For five glorious September days now, we’ve had the Broken Group almost to ourselves: lazy picnic lunches in sheltered coves, paddling into sea caves, beachcombing for breast-shaped moon-snail casings and hiking past shell middens into an ancient Sitka spruce forest. We’ve gunkholed along rocky shorelines in our kayaks, drifting above the intertidal world of burgundy and orange batstars, pink sunstars, apple green anemones and hermit crabs. Arctic loons, great blue herons, orange-footed oystercatchers and cormorants are just some of the 230 species here. Natalie’s silent raising of her paddle overhead is our cue to stop paddling, be silent and look.

It’s hard to believe the Broken Group was once home to more than 10,000 First Nations people. But the evidence is all around us, in shell middens, in tranquil lagoons where rock-walled fish traps line the shore, in burial caves – and in Ty Marshall, a handsome apprentice Tseshaht guide who joins us halfway through the trip and shares stories his people have passed down from father to son. Traditionally his people have gathered cod, salmon and sea mammals off Keith Island. The island’s timber was used for planks and canoes. Hermit crab shells still rattle from the clothing of Tseshaht dancers.

Natalie interrupts my mental slide show. It’s time to leave island 32 to paddle back to Keith Island for our last night. Magic time: the moon is almost full. Natalie promises bioluminescence – the startling flash of millions of tiny sea creatures always present but rarely visible. We slip into our kayaks and, in the shadow of a neighbouring island, each stroke of our paddles lifts and spills lime-green stars, our hulls cutting the wine-dark sea like laser beams. We are stardust. No one speaks. As we slowly paddle back to our campsite, Natalie breaks the silence. "This is what animals do: eat, travel and sleep."

Early the next morning, ours is the last boat to slip off the beach. Only our skid marks show we have landed. There is not a ripple on the water. By a trick of light, there is no horizon. The white clouds and blue sky are now the sea. Paddling, I glance sideways at the other kayaks. All are suspended in the Happy Place.
 

piggy-back paddlers

 
Not a camper? Check out Mothership kayaking from historic Columbia III.

"The Columbia is coming!" was the welcome cry along B.C.’s coast early in the last century, when a series of stout ships operating under the Anglican church’s Columbia Coast Mission served isolated logging camps, lighthouses, floating homes and First Nations villages, bringing medical help, religious services, Christmas parties and cartoons (an enticement to visit the dentist). Today the cry still goes up, but from kayakers as they paddle around a remote rocky bluff to see the waiting Columbia III, a handsomely restored 21-metre vessel now operated by the Campbell family as Mothership Adventures.

Why this company: To explore the pristine wilderness destinations of Desolation Sound, Broughton Archipelego, Johnstone Strait and the Great Bear Rainforest from the comfort of a mothership, knowing that after a day’s kayaking there are hot showers, freshly brewed organic coffee, Fern’s gourmet dinners with wine in a cozy salon — and a dry bed in one’s own cabin.

Comfort and security for novice kayakers aside, a mothership also equals unique experiences for hard-core sea kayakers. The ship repositions daily for a greater variety of wilderness than camping kayakers can hope to cover. Columbia can also easily access remote stretches of rugged coastline and steep-sided, glacial-carved fiords expedition kayakers avoid (knowing there is nowhere to camp or haul out in an emergency). "We never backtrack," says Ross Campbell, former coastal logging helicopter pilot and current owner/captain, who knows just where to position guests for their best chance to see pods of 30 orcas in the Broughton Archipelago or beachcombing bears in the seldom-visited Great Bear Rainforest. And while most guests want to paddle rain or shine, they can always opt to stay on board with a book from the ship’s well-stocked library, or to chat with Ross in the wheelhouse as he navigates the many islands and inlets, always remaining out of sight and hearing of the paddlers.

Details pay off: Personal kayaking gear is neatly stowed under cover on the aft deck; a mini-crane system quickly retrieves the double Necky kayaks from the roof; professional sea kayak guides Miray and her partner Luke, born and bred on the West Coast and passionate about their work, help guests embark off the broad stern swim grid -- managing the tricky balance between professional service and relaxed informality just right. As one visitor put it: "First class people running a first class operation."

Day trips can include paddles up river estuaries past lush grassy meadows, lake swims, walks to abandoned native villages, picnic lunches and fresh crab feasts. Wildlife is everywhere. Brightly coloured intertidal life clings to the surf-swept rocks; sea otters and seals play in the kelp beds; osprey and eagles laze overhead and, with luck, wolves or a grizzly lope along a beach. At night, a Celtic tune or two from Luke and Miray and much laughter at anchor in a remote cove, lulled by the cradle that is Columbia III.

Who should go: Beginners and up.

Tips: Book Vancouver to Bella Bella flight early -- for cheaper fare (and to guarantee a seat). Take waterproof, not waterrepellant, rain gear; technical inner clothes wick sweat.

Basics: June to October, depending on destination (e.g., Great Bear Rainforest -- August and September only). Departures from Campbell River, Port McNeill and Bella Bella. All-inclusive rates (gear, accommodation, guides, meals, wine) run from $1,900 for four nights to $2,850 for six. Themed tours (historical, photographic, natural history) run two, four or six nights ($690 to $2,850). 1-888-833-8887; www.mothershipadventures.com
 

island fix-you uppers

 
Why this company: Batstar sets the standard for B.C.’s kayak touring industry; co-owner Blake Johnson is past president of the Sea Kayaking Guides’ Alliance of B.C. Batstar uses the best gear, pays top wages and benefits and rotates staff to avoid burnout.

Details pay off: B&B overnights both before and after each trip allow guests to re-pack gear into supplied dry sacks. Chartering a water taxi back to Port Alberni at trip’s end cuts travel time in half. Only Batstar guests have exclusive use of Keith Island, ancestral site of the Tseshaht Band (a big plus in peak season with only eight campsites in Broken Group).

Who should go: Beginners and up

Tips: Pack everything on Batstar’s excellent gear list; all kayaking, camping and kitchen equipment is provided. September expeditions mean less fog and rain than in summer, fewer kayakers.

Basics: Weekly, May to October. $1,689/person; eight guests, two guides. 1-877-449-1230; www.batstar.com