Victoria has a staggering number of hiking trails that almost always reach something amazing.. and radically different. From Goldstream Park's spawning salmon to the marvellous Goldstream Train Trestle. You can hike dozens of beautiful, coastal kilometres in Juan de Fuca Provincial Park and East Sooke Regional Park. Victoria is a hiker's paradise.
TheWestCoastTrail
The West Coast Trail traces a route along a 75 kilometre section of Vancouver Island's hostile west coast. The trail looks over the Graveyard of the Pacific, home to hundreds of shipwrecks over the centuries. The Graveyard of the Pacific necessitated the construction of the West Coast Trail to save lives from the frequent shipwrecks.
The West Coast Trail is a very tough hike. About one out of one hundred hikers don't make it, they need to be rescued. That's why there are so many fees. By the time you are done preparing and registering, you laugh at how hiking got so expensive. Isn't hiking usually free? All the costs are for saving people that don't make it, and for all the trail construction. And there is a lot. A lot of both.
Consider the one in one hundred statistic. It's really bad. Think of it, every day 75 people enter and every two days someone has to be rescued. To be rescued requires no little effort. The place is a jungle. It's no wonder that there is supposed cell phone coverage all the way (though there isn't). Still you feel comforted, sitting on the beach, in the middle of the West Coast Trail, marvelling at the serenity of such a remote place, then a coast guard helicopter, combing the coast, swoops past.
The comfort and serenity soon pass as you notice two boats, out past the kelp beds, shadowing you as you now walk along the otherwise perfect beach. It's eerie, they move in perfect time with you walking. Then you realize, they are fishing, or sightseeing. Either way, they are not concerned with you, but also oblivious to spoiling the supposed serenity of the West Coast Trail. It's hard to feel like you are days away from civilization, when boats follow you along the coast.
It's hard to get reliable information on injuries and fatalities on the West Coast Trail. You might as well start calling it that as it's a hike that requires a lot of studying beforehand. Whenever you hike a long trail in British Columbia and the danger of bears is so overshadowed by other dangers as to be insignificant, you'd better worry. You need to examine tide charts to determine your route. Most beach routes have parallel forest trails. For the most part you can walk the beach sections pretty care free, however there are a couple areas where you could find yourself blocked by the rising tide. Or worse, trapped by it. If you don't put your tent above the high tide mark, you may become engulfed in water as you sleep. In the summer months you can find lots of nice sand above the high tide mark, close to the rainforest wall. Imagine waking up to ocean waves soaking into your tent. To be safe from high tide, look for grass and weeds in the sand, camp there. Grass tends to not grow if the tide reaches them.
You wonder why the ocean battered beach extends past these patches of green if this is true. Evidently, in the winter, stormy weather batters the beach further up. Up where you now safely put up your tent. This is one of the ironies of the West Coast Trail. When they drill into you the need for waterproof this and waterproof that. You assume, it's because of the constant rainforest rain. That's only part of it. There is the engulfing white wall every morning of mist. Cold, wet and ever-present, mist. Damping everything. Be careful with your sleeping bag. A down bag will soak up moisture quickly if you let it. If you catch a few days in a row of rain, you will have moisture creep into everything. It is a constant battle, but maybe you'll get lucky and it will be sunny everyday!
Anyway, on to the considerations...
Decide where you want to start and finish. It is remarkably convenient and inexpensive to park at one side and bus or boat to the other. Which one to choose is a flip of a coin. Driving or bussing from Victoria to Port Renfrew, parking, then bussing to Bamfield is cheap and easy. And you have your vehicle waiting for you at the end. The bus is only $75 and departs daily. The main consideration it seems is that the Port Renfrew side of the trail is the most gruelling, and therefore good to get over with first. But then, others say that your pack is lighter and your legs stronger at this part if you start from Bamfield. One important consideration seems to be forgotten. The fact that starting from the Port Renfrew side is not only tough with constant ups and downs, but it's dark and relentless in the jungle. You don't see the beach for hours, and when you do they are not terribly pretty, rocky beaches. Instead if you start at Bamfield, you see immediately spectacular sandy beaches, breathtaking views and mild, though interesting terrain. It's a worthy consideration to consider your level of excitement after the first day on the trail. From Port Renfrew, tough, ugly and boring, or from Bamfield, breathtaking and spectacular. The quality of campsites is also a consideration.
You must harden yourself to a lot of hard, uncomfortable and difficult hiking. That's both the expected and unexpected requirement of the West Coast Trail. It's tough, everyone knows that. But it's tough in a way that expectations realize and don't understand. It's wet. Wet all the time. Wet in a way that saps enthusiasm. Tires you quickly. Makes you rush, slip on stairs, jump onto a wet rock that will break your leg. You will cover yourself in a hood and move faster. This is the thing you must brace yourself for. It will be wet a lot. When you are on the trail and it's raining, you are waking up in a damp tent in a fogged in beach. Your stove won't start and you feel heavy before moving. Remember, you have to have true grit. It's wet and cold and miserable all around. But you are full of excitement and strength. Of course it's raining today. If it wasn't it wouldn't be the West Coast Trail. Make sure you wake up to this mindset. Because if you don't, well...
The other considerations wane in importance. Good hiking boots. Winter ones. Ones that are not mid or low cut. Gaiters, make sure they are removable without having to take off your boots, so velcro or zippered. Combine them with good waterproof, Gore-Tex boots, and waterproof pants or shorts, and a Gore-Tex jacket, and pack with a secure, waterproof cover and you will be good. One important thing will happen to you. It is something easy to avoid and care for, blisters. Bring duct tape or whatever you have to combat blisters. No matter how tough you are you will get them. If you feel a blister coming on, just put a small strip of duct tape over it as you would with a bandage. The duct tape will shield the blister from whatever is rubbing against it and whatever pain you were getting should not increase. A painful blister can ruin your hike, but a bit of duct tape can prevent them easily. Continued here..
When shipping in and out of Juan de Fuca Strait rapidly increased in the mid 1800's and an alarming and costly number of ships were lost, the need for a ...
The West Coast Trail is incredible. Everything about it is amazing. From the wildly, incomprehensibly enormous trees to endless jaw dropping views. And ...
The West Coast Trail hiking season is confined to just five months due to the dangerously stormy weather during the winter months. In the winter the days ...
There are three entry/exit points for the West Coast Trail, however the midway entry/exit point at Nitinaht Narrows is for hikers only hiking part of the trail. ...
There are lots of options to getting to the West Coast Trail. The trail is linear so you have to arrange to get to the trailhead as well as from your exit ...
The West Coast Trail is a very tough hike. About one out of one hundred hikers don't make it, they need to be rescued. That's why there are so many fees. By ...
The West Coast Trail is a very tough hike. About one out of one hundred hikers don't make it, they need to be rescued. That's why there are so many fees. By the time you are done preparing and registering, you laugh at how hiking got so expensive. Isn't hiking usually free? All the costs are for saving people that don't make it, and for all the trail construction. And there is a lot. A lot of both. 
Prologue
Day 1 Pachena to Darling 
Michigan Creek at 12k 
