Day 89, Monday, September 12.

Said Thank you and Farewell to the Robins this morning and headed over to the West side of the island. As I was packing up, Susan gave me a bag full of fresh smoked salmon another of super yummy cubed stake and a couple of others full of their own yummies. I’ve really enjoyed my stay with John, Susan, Noel, and Dean and will definitely keep in touch with them.
As I turned off of HWY 1 onto HWY 4 to Uclueclet, I passed another motorcyclist towing a trailer. He later caught up to me as I was stopped beside the road to put on another layer of clothing and invited me to join him for a coffee. Why not, right? Maybe this would be another of my great accidental crossings! Yep. Definitely turned out to be just that. It turns out that he was riding a 1978 Honda Goldwing and the trailer he was towing contained the tools of his trade (espresso and coffee machine repair). The place he was headed for a coffee turned out to be a micro roaster called Karma Coffee, and the cool chance meeting this time turned out not to be the motorcyclist who flagged me down but the owner of the coffee shop, Michael. Michael has been on trips all over the world and has done many of them on motorcycles (rented from what ever location he’s visiting.) He showed me a bunch of pictures of himself and his family in various locations of the Asian continent and invited me to come back later in the week to join him on a trip over to Lasqueti Island. Lasqueti is located between Vancouver Island and the mainland about 20 miles due north of Parksville where HWY 19 and HWY 4 to Ucluelet intersect. Michael suggested that I show back up at the coffee shop on Thursday afternoon and that I set my tent up in his back yard for the night prior to heading over to Lasqueti. Why not, right? I’ve got no idea what’s in store for me over on Lasqueti but I’m eager for more adventure!
HWY 4 would be a perfect motorcycle road if it weren’t for the construction. It’s nice and curvy, winds its way through some incredibly beautiful forests and next to equally beautiful lakes as is cuts across to the West side of the Island. Only problem is that there are now large sections of it which are torn up for repaving. Torn up and replaced by lose, rutted gravel. Oh yeah, and big construction trucks which don’t give motorcycles much leeway as they pass. I must admit though, that these torn up sections are still far from the worst roads I’ve traveled on during this trip.
When I got to the West coast of the Island, I headed into Ucluelet to check out camp sites and then over to Tofino to check out whale watching excursions and possible hikes in the Pacific Rim National Forest. Turns out that there basically aren’t any hikes (I don’t count 1 mile round trip walks as real hikes) in the Forest but instead there are lots of access walks down to the ocean. Can’t win ‘em all, right? I decided to stay in a campground, called Middle Beach, just South of Tofino and about 5 miles North of Pacific Rim NP. Also found that there are loads of choices for whale watching in Tofino, all of which charge about $70 Canadian for a 2 – 3 hour trip
One other thing I learned this evening. When you’re going to be traveling over extremely rough road, it’s definitely not a good idea to leave bananas in your cooler along with hard plastic containers. Doing so results in blackened banana mush spread throughout your entire cooler and a lot of work cleaning it up!