Vancouver Island, from Victoria to the beaches of Tofino

An island between forest and Pacific

Vancouver Island is about 460 kilometres long. The trip starts in Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, which you explore on foot around the harbour, between the Parliament Buildings and the Empress hotel. At the corner of Beacon Hill Park, a marker shows Mile Zero of the Trans-Canada Highway. Highway 14 then follows the Strait of Juan de Fuca to Port Renfrew. There, the pools of Botanical Beach are uncovered at low tide, with their starfish and sea anemones.

Highway 4 is the only road to Tofino and Ucluelet. It runs through Coombs, where goats graze on the roof of a market in summer, then between the tall trees of Cathedral Grove. At the end, Long Beach stretches for kilometres of sand between the forest and the breakers. Tofino is where the surfers gather; in Ucluelet, the Wild Pacific Trail follows the coast. From Tofino, boats go out to see grey whales and, at low tide, black bears on the shore.

The north is wilder. After Campbell River, Highway 19 crosses about 200 kilometres of forest to Telegraph Cove, a former telegraph station that became a hamlet on stilts. A fire destroyed part of its wooden boardwalk at the end of 2024. From May to October, boats leave from here to see the orcas and humpback whales of Johnstone Strait.

The north of the island is the land of the Kwakwaka’wakw. From 1884 to 1951, a federal law banned First Nations from holding the potlatch, the great gift-giving ceremony that marks births, marriages and deaths. On the west coast live the Nuu-chah-nulth, who once hunted whales from canoes. On the shore of Sproat Lake, the K’ak’awin petroglyphs show mythological figures; no one knows how old they are.

Duncan calls itself the “City of Totems”: there are around forty in its streets. It is also a place to buy Cowichan sweaters, hand-knitted in undyed wool.

The old-growth forest and the “War in the Woods”

The west coast gets very heavy rain, which grows a temperate rainforest of Douglas firs, western red cedars and Sitka spruce. In Cathedral Grove, some Douglas firs are more than 800 years old; the largest is more than 9 metres round. Storms regularly bring trees down there.

In 1993, protesters blocked the logging roads of Clayoquot Sound, near Tofino, to stop the felling. There were more than 850 arrests, a record in Canada. Only the Fairy Creek blockades, near Port Renfrew, from 2020 onwards, have surpassed it. Clayoquot Sound became a Unesco biosphere reserve in 2000.

What not to miss

1. 1The Butchart GardensThe Sunken Garden, created from 1909 onwards in a worked-out limestone quarry.
2. 2Botanical BeachSandstone shelves hollowed with tide pools, best seen at low tide.
3. 3Cathedral GroveDouglas firs more than 800 years old, beside Highway 4.
4. 4Long BeachThe great beach of the Pacific Rim reserve, between Tofino and Ucluelet.
5. 5The Kinsol TrestleA wooden railway bridge from 1920, 44 metres high, reopened to walkers in 2011.
6. 6Elk FallsA suspension bridge 64 metres above the canyon.

Vancouver Island in pictures

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The old-growth forest of Cathedral Grove, its trunks and roots covered in moss.

The Vancouver Island table

On the island, most of what you eat comes from the sea. Salmon is sold fresh or smoked, and Campbell River calls itself the “Salmon Capital of the World”. Fanny Bay’s oysters are well known; in Victoria, you eat fish and chips on the floating docks of Fisherman’s Wharf.

The Cowichan Valley makes wine and cider. For something sweet, the Nanaimo bar layers a biscuit base, buttercream and chocolate. At the Empress, afternoon tea is still served in the English style.