We took the ferry from Tsawwassen to Victoria and stayed on the island for 8 days. Vancouver Island is breathtaking, with endless green forests and beautiful ocean views. Our base camp for the first 3 days was the Goldstream Campground, from where we hiked to a nice little waterfall and explored the area and the city.

The whale watching tour in Victoria was definitely the first highlight on our trip and checked an item on our bucketlist – seeing orcas in their natural habitat. We were very lucky and saw 8 orcas, 1 humpback whale, harbour porpoises, many seals and sea lions.

We continued our way trough Port Renfrew and Nanaimo, spending one of the nights on a gorgeous pullout near the highway.

Our next stop was Tofino, well-known for its beautiful beaches and perfect waves for surfers. We spent 3 nights on a campground in Ucluelet and visited the Pacific Rim National Park, looking for wildlife and sunny beach days. Unfortunately, it was quite foggy at the seaside, so we could neither get the full surfer beach experience nor did we find any bears in the area.

So we made our way back to Nanaimo to take the ferry to Horseshoe Bay and start our route through the national parks in British Columbia and Alberta.