Slow and serene off Nootka Island

Bears, sea otters and marbled murrelets show paddlers the Nuchatlitz way

Sea otter rafts near Nootka Island

NOOTKA ISLAND, B.C. — The afternoon sun glints sharply off the rolling blue swell south of Rosa Island and it’s difficult to follow Brad’s finger to where the glistening bulbs of ocean kelp end and the glossy heads of sea otters begin.

We squint from our kayaks’ cautious distance to take in the fragile “raft” that the otters have created on a bed of seaweed.

Brad Comeau — one of two Gabriola Cycle and Kayak guides who’ve accompanied this group of six paddlers to the edges of Nuchatlitz provincial park — describes how twenty or so otters will float together on their backs to groom their thick, insulating fur and feed on sea urchins they have gathered on their belly.

Paddling a wide swath past other relaxed-looking rafts, it’s hard to believe that it was the sea otter’s famously luxuriant coat that led to this creature’s near extinction.

Central Valley Greenway for cycling

Vancouver area multi-use trail offers a bushwhack to bikers willing to explore

The name “Still Creek” may not quicken the pulse of southern B.C.’s white water paddlers; but the blackberry thorns that line the tributary’s urban bike trail are sure to draw blood from a Lower Mainland peddler or two.

Greenway looks like a country lane between Gilmore and Willingdon

Not only is Still Creek one of Vancouver’s original city streams, but it actually flows away from the ocean and toward the Fraser River. While municipal planners pore over a 50 year plan to rehabilitate the historic watershed; a Vancouver-based collection of cycling advocates have ~ with the support of VanCity, Translink, Transport Canada, and other private and public organizations ~ scratched up enough funding, support and publicity in six years to slam a multi-use trail down along its course.

When it’s signed, sealed and landscaped in March of 2007, the 22-kilometre Central Valley Greenway will span Vancouver, Burnaby, and New Westminster and offer those cities’ residents an chance to travel to workplaces, shopping centres, schools, and transit stations without their cars; more Greenway, less Kingsway.

Until then, adventurous local cyclists have discovered that ~ as Richard Campbell of Better Environmentally Sound Transportation (B.E.S.T.) puts it ~ there’s “a functional interim route” just begging for a good urban bushwhack.

Hostels can be ‘lux’ for just a few bucks

West Coast accommodations debunk myths and welcome families

TOFINO, B.C. — It’s a characteristically wet, winter day and, as a Whalers on the Point Guesthouse visitor, you find yourself faced with a difficult decision so early in the day. Should you sip rosehip tea and watch for whales in the solarium, curl up with a thick West Coast guidebook in front of the massive stone fireplace or bake a batch of chunky cookies with some new British, Aussie and Brazilian friends in the kitchen?

Life is good at this exclusive, award-winning Vancouver Island hostel and — for the nominal cost of a hosteling membership — it’s yours for only $22 a night.

A hostel?

“A lot of people in North America are still unaware of hostels,” says Shelbey Sy, from Hostelling International’s Vancouver office. She and other staff realized that, despite its century-old history as a member-driven, not-for-profit association, Canadians still have a lot of misconceptions about hostels.

The staff started hosting workshops regularly called “Hostelling 101″ to debunk myths, share hostel basics and give “locals” the scoop on what five million worldwide travellers already know: hostels can be “lux” for not a lot of bucks.