West Coast Trail Planning

West Coast Trail Vancouver Island 

When I proposed that we spend our 10-year anniversary of being together at the Willows Inn on Lummi Island, DD jumped at the chance to say “Well, why don’t we also hike the West Coast Trail?” The West Coast Trail, as it turns out, is a 75 km, 47 mile trail on Vancouver Island that brings trekkers through a meandering path of rainforest and beach, with various types of terrain – boardwalks, mud, fallen trees, boulders, rocks, soft sand, firm sandstone, and ladders. Lots of ladders, apparently.  

Permits One needs a permit and reservation from Parks Canada. 60 permits total are issued for each day, 30 for each starting trailhead (Pachena, North to South; or Gordon River, South to North). Danny and I plan to do North to South, leaving the notoriously harder bits for last. When we had checked a couple of months prior, there was nothing available. We were then planning on taking our chances with a walk-up day-of permit. However, one evening in late June, Danny happened to look again at the Parks Canada website and discovered availability on the exact date that would work for us and our Willows Inn reservations! And so we booked, and reserved our spots!    

Permit Fees Here’s where one might be in for a bit of sticker shock. The itemized receipt from Parks Canada lists the following:

        • 2 ReservationFee-WCT @ $24.50   GSTIncl $2.33     $49.00
      • 2 WCT-Use-PerPerson @ $127.50  GSTIncl $12.14  $255.00
      • 2 WCT-NitinatFerry @ $16.00         GSTIncl $1.52     $32.00
      • 2 WCT-GordonFerry @ $16.00       GSTIncl $1.52      $32.00

 The total was $368 Canadian, which came out to be $298 US with the conversion rate (28 June 2015) at the time. Contrast this to the 211-mile John Muir Trail, where you only need to get a permit from your entry trailhead, which comes out to be $5/ permit and $5/person – $15 for a 2-person permit. Parks Canada’s handy information brochure for the WCT indicates the fees are for “rescue services, information services, construction of ladders, cable cars, boardwalks and bridges.” In addition, though campsites are primitive and entirely backcountry, the West Coast Trail has certain amazing luxuries like composting toilets(!) at most of the campsites on the trail. These must take some upkeep and maintenance as well.  

Transportation to Trailhead

            • We fly to Seattle, using frequent flier miles on Virgin and throw in a bit of extra cash for upgrades.
      • From Seattle we take the Clipper Ferry to Victoria on Vancouver Island. Cost – $110×2
      • We spend a night on Victoria at the Royal Scot hotel, before leaving the next day, bright and early for our 6:45am 6-hour bus ride on the West Coast Trail Express Trailbus to our Trailhead at Pachena Bay. There is no alternative to the Trailbus unless you want to drive and leave your own car at one trailhead for a week, and take a ferry to the other trailhead, depending on where you’re starting. Trailbus cost: $241.70 (roundtrip for 2; Victoria to Pachena and Port Renfrew to Victoria).

Transportation from Trailhead/ End of Hike Our trip back is another logistical nightmare matter. Once we finish at the Gordon River Trailhead, we’re supposed to take a ferry back to Port Renfrew, catch the Trailbus back to Victoria, and hope to get to Vancouver (to visit with my favourite Aunt and cousins). Basically the return schedule is as follows:

            • Port Renfrew to Victoria on Trailbus – arrives Victoria at 7:45pm
      • If everything works out, we should be at the Tsawwassen BC Ferry Terminal at 10:35pm, at which point we’ll make our way to my Aunt’s house in Richmond.

As for our route, we’re expecting to hit the trail on the early afternoon of Tuesday, 28 July, finishing on Sunday, 2 August, roughly following Kevin’s excellent itinerary from his trip in 2011.

  Weight, excluding water and including trekking poles and shared items = 24lbs! 4 lbs lighter than my starting weight for Rae Lakes! No bear can and lightweight upgraded Thermarest, plus shaved ounces off here and there, makes for happy lighter backpack!

Thanks to Danny and his quest to be ever ultralight, and the forecast of good weather on this particular trip, I’ve managed to get my packweight down from the Rae Lakes weight of about 28-29 lbs without water, to about 24 lbs! More on gear later.

And that’s that for now. On to bed. We leave for the airport tomorrow to catch our 7:30am flight to Seattle.

West Coast Trail 2015 Posts

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