A Visit to San Josef Bay
Over the summer, my amazing nephews and my new fur-nephew all came up for their annual monthly visit to the beautiful North End of the Island. While last year was all about relaxing, this year we went exploring!
One of our unanimous favorites, that we can't wait to return to next summer, and hopefully for a longer visit, is San Josef Bay. Everyone agreed that despite the long 2-hour drive from Port Alice to get to the starting point to hike in, and the 45-minute hike through the woods to get to the beach, it was well worth the adventure to get there! We were thankful we remembered to bring our Bluetooth speaker along and downloaded music which made the drive much more entertaining as it is a bumpy ride in places and the sound of silent vibrations would have gotten on our nerves quickly. One should note if you're taking your four-legged adventurers with you, this is also Sea Wolf territory as well as Cougar and Black Bear Territory - so be on alert at all times and keep your fur-kids on a leash and close by. If you're hoping to camp overnight - they do request you leave your canine companions at home. If you want to take your fur-kids with you, be sure to make it only a day trip visit.
We all loved the interesting bridges, beautiful old growth trees, notes about local history and even finding the occasional bear poop in the woods as we trekked through to our destination. While my sister in law and eldest nephew and Rufus hiked ahead full speed, my youngest nephew and I took our time and enjoyed checking out all the really interesting flora along the way and enjoyed singing songs along the way to let the bears know we were there.
Once we finally arrived at our destination, all 3 of my nephews charged the beach like tiny warriors! They had never seen a beach like this before, although, for me, it reminded me of fun times spent as a child on the beautiful beaches in Ocean Shores, Washington. The kids enjoyed jumping and beating up and diving into the crazy waves and racing along the beach together. Their excitement was truly contagious and we all ended up in the water playing and splashing about despite the cool weather. We also found out that Rufus found a new found passion for digging on the beach and loved chasing and running with the boys along the waves, even though he wasn't sure what to make of the waves.
As you can see, however, he greatly enjoyed strolling along the beach and running and playing in the soft sand, even if he wasn't keen, just yet on those rolling waves. And while it looks like we didn't heed my own earlier advice about on-leash behavior, please note, that he was in a harness with a leash and was always very close to his momma.
Overall we had an amazing time that was all too short for our liking and we cannot wait to return next year and highly recommend making the trip! Next year we are hoping to explore more of the trails there and we may even leave Rufus at home and enjoy a quiet night camping out if the weather allows. Have you visited San Josef Bay before? What did you think?!
