I woke up the next morning with a new perspective. It had rained almost every day in October in Vancouver. If I wanted to hike with Tucker, I couldn’t wait until the sun peeked out from behind the clouds. I had bought him a rain jacket—excuse me, a “Vancouver Jacket.” Might as well get some use out of it.
Vancouver boasts a rather extensive public park: Stanley Park. At just over 1000 acres (or 1.5 square miles), it beats New York’s Central park by over 150 acres. While Central Park is, well, central, with views of the cityscape between the leaves of the trees, Stanley Park rests at the end of downtown, a peninsula of wildlife in an already wild space.
Despite the downpour, plenty of people were around in the more urban areas of the park to check out tours and monuments. I sought to be a little off the beaten path and closer to nature. I didn’t have to look far. I carried south along the park road to find parking and off to my right, I espied a full grown and particularly healthy adult coyote at the trail intersection.
Upon parking, I saw notices and signs about “how to co-exist with wildlife” and how to appropriately deal with coyotes. Despite urbanity being less than a mile away, Tucker and I had entered the wild, with the forest to our backs and the ocean to our front.
We headed toward the ocean.
Despite the downpour, plenty of people were around in the more urban areas of the park to check out tours and monuments. I sought to be a little off the beaten path and closer to nature. I didn’t have to look far. I carried south along the park road to find parking and off to my right, I espied a full grown and particularly healthy adult coyote at the trail intersection.
Upon parking, I saw notices and signs about “how to co-exist with wildlife” and how to appropriately deal with coyotes. Despite urbanity being less than a mile away, Tucker and I had entered the wild, with the forest to our backs and the ocean to our front.
We headed toward the ocean.
Tucker didn’t seem to mind the rain or jacket as much as I thought he would. We walked down to the seawall (or boardwalk) and looked out into the ocean. It wasn’t until about ten minutes of letting Tucker walk across the sands and dip his toes in the Canadian Pacific Ocean that I saw the sign stating, “No Dogs Allowed On Beach.” Whoops.
No one was around anyway. We took to the forest, finding a trail that would meander its way back to our car parked at a baseball field up the hill.
Being in the woods here is like being in primordial times. You expect a dinosaur to come around a bend in the trail. The trees are ancient and glorious. And when they are killed, new ones sprout from their chopped off tops. You might not be able to see the street sign in the lower quarter left of this picture for perspective, but the top of this tree where the roots spill over is about eight feet high.
Being in the woods here is like being in primordial times. You expect a dinosaur to come around a bend in the trail. The trees are ancient and glorious. And when they are killed, new ones sprout from their chopped off tops. You might not be able to see the street sign in the lower quarter left of this picture for perspective, but the top of this tree where the roots spill over is about eight feet high.
This antler-like mossy head-dress for giants is in the distance and yet is still ginormous. My guess is that the width at the bottom is around fifteen feet.
Here’s Tucker in front of a tree. Just one tree. I couldn't get the whole thing in one shot.
Here's the tree from far away:
The thing no one tells you is that Vancouver is actually a rainforest. (That would explain the copious amounts of precipitation.)
This fabulous ecosystem is about seven feet tall and about five feet wide and looks as if it was designed by Jim Henson.
This fabulous ecosystem is about seven feet tall and about five feet wide and looks as if it was designed by Jim Henson.
But it’s not all forests. This open meadow gave me the most magical, surreal feeling. Something went down here many many ages ago, but I’m not sure exactly what.
Historians chose this giantess of a tree to reconstruct and hold upright for everyone to see in the parking area. I think I saw bigger, more alive ones on our hike, but I guess this makes it easy for tourists.
Tucker and I ran into two brindle Boxer-mixes running about off leash on the trail, and he happily greeted them and wanted to play. Their owner was also pleasant. Other than that, Tucker and I had the woods to ourselves.
If Tucker and I want to fit in, we need to be like the locals. Rain cannot deter us. Driving to work, I see women out and about wearing baseball hats and rain gear and hiking books. At least I don’t dress differently from them. But I’m not as tough as they are. I’ll get there, though. Maybe Tucker will even get to be like the two Boxers we met—no Vancouver jackets needed, just running in the rain like it’s the greatest thing in the world.
For now, we’ll do one day at time, not let the weather deter us from adventures, and see where the day takes us.
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