🚀 go-pugleaf

"Alan Sausse" <Alan.Sausse@tesco.net> wrote:

>David,
>
>Thanks for the advice.  Do you have any details of the West Coast Trail -
>any websites with any info?
>
>David Crowe wrote in message ...
>>Your other option is to hike a low elevation trail like the famous West
>>Coast Trail, it is available all year.
>

The West Coast Trail is theoretically hikeable year-round, however
1) During the winter months, expect torrential downpours and washouts to
make the storms on the west coasts of Scotland and Wales look like sunny
summer days. A weather station nearby holds several North American records
for daily and annual rainfall. Most of it falls in the winter.
2) Unless you bring along your own boat, and are expert in navigating the
local waterways, you will have to arrange crossings of the Nitinat Narrows
and the Port San Juan bay. Neither are swimmable, jumpable or wadeable in
the best of conditions. Hikers are carried across these crossings by
locals, and these services do not operate off-season.
3) You will be very lonely. No support or assistance.
3) For reasons including the above, Parks Canada, if not actually
forbidding it, strongly advises that you do not hike the trail in the
winter months.

Come in the summer and do it. Highly recommended. I did it in July 1992 and
had a day and a half of rain, followed by five days of perfect sun. If you
try and do it in the winter, you'll be lucky if it doesn't rain for every
minute you're out there.

In the winter, an option may be to try the Juan de Fuca trail nearer
Victoria. Sort of a "light" version of the WCT, day hikes are possible,
even using Victoria as a base, and there are multiple entry points. 


Bill in Vancouver
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