Pacific Rim National Park is my favourite place on Earth. During my childhood, we used to come up with another family and stay in cabins on the beach. Exploring the beachs, forests and offshore islands are some of the fondest memories of my youth. I’ve seen a bit of the rest of the world, but nothing quite compares to the raw beauty of Vancouver Island’s west coast.
It feels to me like the newest place on Earth. It rains here more than nearly anywhere else in North America, and the long, sandy beaches are constantly pounded by big waves. Not Hawaii big, certainly, but big enough to make it the best spot for surfing on Canada’s west coast.
I wish I knew more about geology, because then I could describe in detail the particular craggy, charcoal-coloured rocks that enclose each beach like parentheses. The rock formations are sharp annd full of crevices, as if they’ve just emerged from the Earth’s crust. They form tidal pools that team with life. They’ve yet to be worn smooth by the tumultous sea, but they’re a joy to clamber over.
Years ago, my mother said that she thought Tofino (and its environs) was the only place on the planet to which I had a spiritual connection. She was right. I’ve felt this way in other places (a bleak, snow-covered train station in the Czech Republic, alone in a noisy jungle in Costa Rica), but they’ve never quite renewed my spirit the way this place does.
There are some photos I took at Tofino last year here. What’s your favourite place on Earth?
DarrenBarefoot.com 
I don’t know if it’s my favourite place on earth, but I feel most connected to life, the universe and everything, when I’m in the middle of an open field or desert, with a huge blue sky overhead. As a result, I really like Saskatchewan, and Mongolia, which I dubbed “The Saskatchewan of Asia.”
Ah, Tofino. Many childhood memories. We spent our honeymoon there, and now my brother is getting married there in January (at Middle Beach Lodge). Tofino is one of my favourite places in the world – the other is Montreal. Ah, Montreal. The people, the shopping (epecially shoes) oh, and you’ve always got to get your hair done while you are in town. Yes, I’ll hike in the rain, read by a fire while the waves seem to crash into the end of the world, but I’ll look damn good while doing so…
The rocks are sea-floor basalt, volcanic rocks from the bottom of the ocean, and geologically they are young indeed: they have been mashed against the Pacific coast of North America as our continent drifts west.
Years ago, after a course at the Bamfield Marine Station at the other side of Barkley Sound, I wrote a poem called “9000 Miles” that began, “I wish someone would ask me/What’s the most beautiful place you’ve ever seen?”, and I was writing about the Broken Group Islands in Pacific Rim Park. Eventually my band turned it into a song and we played it on tour in Australia, where we told them what it was about.
Sitting on the Illicilliwaet Galcier at 8,000 Feet on a July day, looking down the valley and realizing how meaningless humans really are on this world.
Take me back…
Choose any regional or provincial park in the area of Southern Vancouver Island or Southwestern BC. (Oddly, the only places where the Arbutus tree is native). Take me to the middle of the forest where the earth is cushioned by thousands of years of trees and animals having lived and died. There’s something about the smell in the West Coast woods, especially just after a rain, and the softness of the air, that I just can’t believe exists anywhere else. That is what replenishes my spirit.
Over here, where I live in Australia, my favourite place is Binalong Bay. It’s in the northeast of the island state, Tasmania. The water is crystalline blue, the rocks a gorgeous gold and ochre. The beaches are pretty much deserted and the weathers almost always good. As it happens, I’m driving there tomorrow with some relatives visiting from Vancouver!
Manuels River, Newfoundland, in the town where I was born, Conception Bay South (no pun intended). I have great memories of swimming there when I was a kid, and spending time with my Dad looking for trilobite fossils amongst the mountains of shale rock – before it was made illegal to do so. It’s a beautiful spot for a walk along the riverside.
For sheer rugged beauty, it’s got to be Iceland. Climbing up the side of a still active volcano at 10 in the evening, with a glorious golden quality to the light thanks to the midnight sun. An amazing experience.
Closely followed by walking amongst the sand dunes in the Libyan desert. In the shadow of a particularly large dune it was as absolutely quiet as I’ve experienced in my life. I could have stayed there for hours.
I love Tofino and the West Coast — I fell in love with Barkley Sound during an internship at Bamfield Marine Station. (Life altering event: seasickness and rave reviews for my video reports led me to abandon marine science for marketing and writing.) But my favourite place in the world is Rathtrevor Beach. Warm water, a sandy beach that goes on forever, and scenic mountain views…all within 20 minutes of my hometown, Nanaimo.
Darren, do you still climb around that little island that gets cut off by the tide on Mackenzie Beach (by Ocean Village – or whatever the name of the place with the A-frames by the beach is)? I haven’t been up there for years – too long! The ledge where you can sit looking out into the Pacific – that’s my favourite place.
Cheers,
Julie
The Gulf Islands – these days mostly Mayne, but any of them will do. On a hot summer day, walking under the arbutus trees, there’s a smell that exists nowhere else – warm, sweet, spicy, with vague hints of ocean. In the winter, it’s a little cooler, fresher, overlaid with the scent of moss and evergreen.
Times moves more slowly, and I enjoy more of the small details of the world around me.