Saturday June 30th. Our lucky day

The plans for today were instantly torn up as Mary discovered that her wallet was missing. This was a potential disaster, and anyone who has been through the process of cancelling cards and having them reissued would know that this is taxing enough in Australia, let alone in another country with no mobile phone access. Add to this the "your call is important to us….Click" as you lose the line.

A frantic search of the vehicle (many nooks and crannies in this one!) and a check at reception bore no fruit. There were three possibilities.. 1. The fish shop (second last place Mary visited), 2. the coffee shop and 3. The police station if someone had handed it in. The fish shop was the most likely so off we headed at 10am. Alas… not open until 12. No go at the coffee shop and the police station doesn't open on weekends!! We had to kill 2 hours, so eventually we headed for the local Tofino Botannical Gardens. After a burnt coffee (Wifi here too!) the gardens proved to be a hidden treasure. 

Some of the marine based history of the place was represented in the gardens

A traditional native canoe. Unlike Australian canoes, this is solid wood carved from the tree.

This salmon boat hauled about a million tons of tuna in its lifetime.

The fantastic lush coastal rainforest goes right to the water's edge.

Some of the art was a bit macabre

It really was a lovely way to spend a couple of hours and when the fish shop opened, Mary emerged with her wallet. The lovely owners had gone to much trouble and eventually had located us to the Crystal Cove Resort, but we had left. This was pretty good detective work because we were booked there under my name so Mary's wallet gave no clues- (she uses her maiden name)

Mary gave them a reward and in a much happier state we headed off. We did a quick walk around the old growth forest not far into the Pacific Rim National Park 

So that explains the desert bit.

and visited Long Beach, 

Wiccaninnish beach,

and Ucluelet 

before heading back across the island in preparation for a whale watching trip tomorrow at Cowichan bay. 

The plan was to head for a provincial park called "Bamberton Park" and take our chances for a campsite. On the way we saw the gigantic fir trees in Cathedral Grove and as Graham had suggested, they were magnificent.

That's my pocket camera sitting on the log, lower centre

Travelling days have little else to report upon, so perhaps it's time to share some knowledge we have gleaned about travelling in Canada, and specifically how to plan your route. Basically it is invaluable to have a mobile with a local sim card, as international roaming is prohibitively expensive. I purchased a Fido sim with a data plan. It cost $65 for a month which includes 500MB of data so this is not for wall to wall face booking.. emails, essential googling and google maps is all you will get, plus the occasional Skype call which has been reliable enough to allow us to book ahead most of the time. There are some drawbacks… booking BC ferries doesn't work on Skype .. their automated system works beautifully until you enter the security code of your credit card… the system reads the number back to you "press 1 to confirm or 2 to change the number". Pressing 1 frantically or even 1hash doesn't work.. "I'm sorry.. we haven't received your response". This is repeated then it disconnects.. very frustrating after a 5 minute process entering all sorts of details including vehicle length and height.

The other indispensable tools have been two apps.

1. Navfree Canada (on iPad). This has been fantastic. It's free, it's reliable and has helped us on multiple occasions. Don't buy Tom Tom or Navigon as this does the job perfectly.

Search for Canada Topographic Maps

2. An iPhone app simply called Canada. I think I've mentioned this one. Its the contour maps of all the regions we've been to and you basically have a detailed map of wherever you are. This is also free.

Did I mention you need an iPad or iPhone too? I suspect Navfree has an android version but I'm not sure about "Canada".

The weather slowly improved today, so that by late evening it was lovely and sunny. Reminded me of the old song that my father loved... "Hello Mother, Hello father"

"Wait a minute, it's stopped raining...."

To finish the day with a continuation of our good luck, we arrived very late at Bamberton Park and asked for a campsite. "We have one left" said the facilities manager....... Yay!