Our second day in Pacific Rim National Park was more fitting the standard climate of this west coast: Rainy! Nevertheless there was one hike we still had to do before we left: An unofficial hike to a crash landed World War II bomber airplane in the rainforest near Tofino! Rain wouldn’t stop us from doing this one!
So we got into our rain jackets and pants and started looking for a trailhead along the highway described by numerous websites. We found it and started following it to an abandoned building. From there it got a level trickier: First and most fun of all – it was muddy! 1.5 km of the hike was through muddy rain forest.
Second challenge: Because of the mud, there were a lot of parallel, alternative trails over the place – probably mixed with wildlife trails not roaming towards the wreckage. We read that people get lost here, especially towards dusk. In the end, reflective markers, bands and guiding ropes made it relatively easy not to lose the trail. And as a fallback, we still had the Garmin inReach.
As we came closer we suddenly spotted the shiny, silver wreckage. The airplane is still in nice condition, thinking that it’s here since 70 years. Of course there has not much been left other than the aluminum hull after souvenir hunters built out most of the instruments and inner “organs”. I’ve also read, that all 7 crew members survived this crash!
After this adventurous hike, we decided to head back towards the coast to catch the ferry to Vancouver the next day. We will then return our beloved Jucy van and catch the flight up to Whitehorse. On our drive bike through Vancouver Island, we checked out Cathedral Grove and awed at 700 year old, massive ciders!
