Long Beach

It was early springtime, before the rains had stopped (in fact, they had just begun, and would continue for the 6 days of our camping trip). Normally, I would not venture out camping on the westcoast during the early springtime. It's just asking for horrible conditions, but such were the circumstances that I would probably never get the chance to do this with these people ever again.

I have never been so wet, so cold, and had so much fun in my life. We spent 6 days tearing up Vancouver Island, exploring 800 year old, old growth forests, visiting remote beaches where there were more eagles than people. We saw drenched black bears, just waking up from their warm caves. We stayed up late into the night, drinking wine from nalgene bottles and philosophizing about life around are small, damp, smoky campfires.

And then we arrived at Long Beach, just outside of Tofino. Stretching on as far as the eye can see, Long Beach is one of the most beautiful beaches I have ever seen (and I've seen beaches in Hawaii, China, Mexico and Spain). Deserted, in the hazy, grey rain, we walked out onto the beach from between bleached driftwood. The only other person, was a lone kayaker. Sitting just out of reach of the tide, he was motionless on the damp sand, in his kayak. Like some sort of statue, the kayaker sat. I still wonder, what he was doing there.

Later, we went down to the beach to watch the sunset. Perched on the rocks, just out of reach of the tidepools, and the encroaching surf, we watched the orange orb of sun sink into the horizon. The small, white fleet of birds dashed up and down the beach, and we watched as the wind blew the remnants of clouds away, and we saw stars for the first time in a week.

If I could go back to that moment, I would.