helloworld Travel Mt Maunganui - Recent staff trips

I was amazed with how green the city was, and that wasn’t even including Stanley Park itself. Gastown, Canada Place (where the cruise terminal is), Yorktown, English Bay Beach and Stanley Park are all great places to explore, and then you can venture out of Vancouver itself to Granville Island for the markets, or to Grouse Mountain and Capilano Suspension Bridge for a bit of adventure. Unfortunately I didn’t get the chance to explore these last 2 places, so I will definitely be visiting again – FOMO!

After my conference we boarded a plane to Campbell River on Vancouver Island. Campbell River is a necessary stop to get to a lot of the bear lodges, and is a small fishing community where the seaplane base is. As it was a Sunday there was not a lot happening, but we did catch some markets before they closed, and found a wonderful seafood restaurant right on the water.

The next day we boarded our seaplane (my first time!) and headed back towards the mainland and into Knight Inlet. This area is only accessible by boat or seaplane, so is very remote. Knight Inlet

Lodge is a floating lodge, located in a stunning area of British Columbia, and is only open May to October. We were reminded before getting on the plane that there are no guarantees what you will see in terms of wildlife – its more like a safari than a zoo, so not to get our hopes up. I don’t think anyone told the wildlife though – it was like they put on a show just for us! Within 1 hour of arriving at the lodge, we had a humpback whale broach 50m off the lodge, had a boat tour through the inlets where we had orca cross in front of us and dolphins ride the wake of the boat. We then did an afternoon boat excursion on the hunt for bears, and came across a mama bear with 2 x 1 year old cubs, plus a nesting pair of bald eagles – and that was just day 1! There is a government policy that boats cannot get closer than 50m to bears so they are undisturbed, but it was incredible to see them searching for shellfish along the shoreline.

Day 2 saw us off on a bear walk (a bit freaky to be honest – I half expected to get attacked!), and was one of the more interesting walks I have been on. We learned so much about bears – among the most interesting to me was that female bears can have multiple cubs to different fathers within the same pregnancy, and also they determine how many of the fertilized eggs actually become viable – if it is a hard season for food, they will dissolve the eggs and have no cubs, and if it is an abundant season they will have multiple cubs. We also got to touch the tufts of hair that male bears had left on their rub trees, plus see bite marks where some young bears had used the vehicle we were in as a chew toy!

That afternoon saw us on another ‘safari’ where we found another mama bear with a 1 month old cub – so darn cute! It can get pretty cold out on the boats, but luckily Knight Inlet Lodge has a sauna with a pretty spectacular view to warm up in! Dinner each night is taken all together in the main dining room, and was delicious! That evening saw us curled up in front of the fire listening to a talk by a local indigenous tribe member who works at the lodge, and tried a local delicacy (not my favourite I must admit!).

Day 3 we went out again to see all the cubs one last time, watch the hummingbirds feed for a bit longer, before it was time to very reluctantly leave and head back to Vancouver again. We were a little early for our flight home to NZ, so made our way to the Outlet mall near to the airport, a great way to pass time before our flight!

Knight Inlet Lodge was more than I could have dreamed of, and for us equally as good as an African safari – definitely worth adding on to a stop in Vancouver!