Ferrying to VANCOUVER ISLAND! (+ road trip to Tofino)

Brisket's on a boat! How cool! What a day today has been. The ferry ride was incredible, the waterfalls have all been beautiful, and we just saw a barrack. I don't know if it gets better than this. Oh man, it is a very, very early morning, but today we are finally heading back to a place that we've wanted to spend more time on for years, Vancouver Island. This island is located west of Vancouver and is full of incredible beaches, hikes, waterfalls, different cities and towns, and other beautiful scenery. For the next two weeks, we're going to be road tripping all around the island. And because it's an island, we're going to take a ferry to get there, so it'll be Brisket's first ferry ride. We're leaving from Horseshoe Bay and we'll be arriving at Departure Bay in the city of Nanaimo on the east coast of Vancouver Island. It's about an hour and 40 minute ride and it costs us $250 round trip for an oversized van and two adults, but it is cheaper for a smaller car. Brisket's on a boat! How cool! This ferry is incredible. The views out here are insane. It's kind of a rainy, cloudy morning, but just seeing the fog lingering over the mountains, it just has that magical Pacific Northwest vibe. It's our first time on a British Columbia ferry. Last time we went to Vancouver Island, we took the Clipper from Seattle and this boat is really, really nice. They have tons of indoor seating, they have a whole store with tons of clothing and items you can buy. We smelled bacon, so I think they have a restaurant here. They have nice flushing toilets. It really has everything you need to be comfortable on this ride. Found the bacon. Nothing like bacon on a boat. Not good bacon. It's not Canadian bacon though. No. We are now arriving at the terminal. All drivers and vehicle passengers, please return to your vehicles. An hour and 40 minutes was not enough time. I could have stayed on this boat forever. It was so beautiful and so much fun. Hi Kona! Did you have a nice boat ride? We're on the island! Island life! Woo! Our goal today is to drive across the island to Tofino, making a bunch of different stops along the way. But first, we need to grab an iconic treat. That is such a tongue twister. That is so hard to say. Try to say that three times fast. You must get a Nanaimo bar. And unfortunately for us, we're here on a Monday and a lot of the popular places to get one are closed. But we did find a spot that is open called Boca Cafe. And we got us two Nanaimo bars. A Nanaimo bar is an iconic Canadian treat. It became popular after World War II and in 2006 it was declared Canada's favorite confection. It has three layers and does not require baking. The bottom layer is a mix of wafer, nut, and shredded coconut. The middle is custard icing. And the top is chocolate ganache. What is really cool about Boca Cafe is all of their Nanaimo bars are gluten free. They also have a gluten free vegan one, so it's totally safe for me to eat. And this is just the traditional style one with the ingredients that Adam mentioned. But they do have other varieties too. We have had these once before at Granville Island Market in Vancouver, but it's been many, many years. Mmm. This is my new favorite word to describe food. Decadent. The bottom has such a nice kind of crunchy texture from the coconut and the nuts in there. Then the inside layer and the top layer both are just super, super creamy. Very, very sweet. They kind of melt in your mouth. It is just delicious. I can totally get why Canadians love this. I think this should be a thing in the U.S. too. Mmm. Catherine nailed the description. I don't have anything to add. Decadent. Delicious. Super sweet. And to make things even sweeter, we just ran into two of our viewers, Kevin and Nadine, who are from Germany and are here on their honeymoon. So thank y'all so much for saying hi. It totally made our day. But now it's back on the road to head to Tofino. We have a handful of quick stops we want to make on our drive to Tofino. And first, we've driven 45 minutes to Englishman River Falls Provincial Park, which has two waterfalls that are just a short walk from the parking area. This waterfall is super impressive. I saw photos of this. I didn't see the rest of it. But when it cascades down here, it gets so tight in this little channel. And there's log jam on top of it. And then on the other side, it widens up. It is a beautiful waterfall. This stop far exceeded my expectations. We are just so happy to be here on Vancouver Island. We've been trying to come here for years. And between COVID and other reasons, it hasn't worked out. So we just have the biggest smile on our face to finally be back here. We're continuing our waterfall explorations at Little Qualicum Falls Provincial Park. And similar to Englishman River Falls Provincial Park, this one has a quick little loop you can do just from the parking area. I can feel the power of this one. Raging. What we've loved about both of these waterfall stops is that they're both just ripping through a gorge. And the water is so powerful. Also, so far, both of these parks have been totally free to visit. And I believe every stop we're making today is free as well. We stopped off at Cameron Lake, which is this gorgeous lake behind me. And the mountains all surrounding it. We thought it would be a perfect spot to make some lunch. If you can't tell, it's so windy out here. You can surf on this lake right now. Yeah. There are some mega white caps. We had hoped to do a hike that would take us above Cameron Lake, but we still have a bit of driving to go and we're running kind of low on time. So we're heading just up the road to the other side of the lake to Macmillan Provincial Park to check out Cathedral Grove, which has giant Douglas fir, Grand firs, Western Hemlocks, and Western Red Cedar trees that we'll get to see along a short loop trail. Cathedral Grove is home to some of the tallest trees in all of Canada. And some of the trees here are 800 years old. We just walked by the tallest tree in the park, the Big Tree, which is 72 meters tall and 9 meters wide. We've been on the island for about six and a half hours, but we really haven't made that much progress towards Tofino. All the stops that we've made so far have been pretty close together. But it's getting later in the day, so we're going to book it to our final stop, which is about an hour 45 minutes away, all the way across the island in Ucluelet. We are driving along this lake here. And on the other side, there's these giant mountains of snow in the back. But what the coolest part is, there's just these really long, big waterfalls just coming down the mountain. Reminds me of the big waterfalls in Hawaii. Beautiful. We're stuck in traffic. There's some construction up here. So we are just dead stopped here. But perks of van life, it's snack time. This hanger box is already coming in handy. What to choose, what to choose. I'm going to go with these guys. Here you go, sir. Alright. Oh, okay. What's up? Heck yeah. Those are crispy. Oh my gosh, we just saw a sign that said bear in the area. And I said, oh man, I hope we see the bear. And then we were driving and I saw something black on the side of the road. I was like, oh, I bet that's the bear, just joking. And it was the bear! Yeah, I thought it was like a piece of rolled up trash or something. Oh my gosh. Especially as we're in this construction zone, there's no way the bear is here. Close to people and stuff. He was just hanging out right there. He was just chilling. And I don't think we got him on camera because I couldn't turn it on him. Dang it. Oh my gosh. I kept hoping we'd see a bear on Vancouver Island and we're off to a good start. We finally made it to Ucluelet, which is a small town right on the Pacific Ocean, just southeast of Tofino. And a very popular thing to do here is hike the Wild Pacific Trail, which is a nine kilometer trail network that has two different sections. And we're going to be hiking the Lighthouse Loop section, which is 2.6 kilometers. This is for bears, not corner bears. This trail has been beautiful so far. There are tons of different views of the coastline. And there's also a bunch of offshoots you can take. They do add on to the 2.6 kilometers, but they are well worth it. A popular stop on this trail is the Amphitrite Lighthouse, which was originally built in 1906 after a shipwreck of the Pass of Melfort and then eventually replaced in 1915 to better withstand hurricane force winds. And it is the cutest little lighthouse I've ever seen and probably the most unique. All right, we made it to Tofino. We are so stoked to be here. Good gosh, chocolate ganache. You know when rap songs like Cardi B and the song we were just listening to called Coming In Hot, they go... I think I could be hired for those parts. I think I'm pretty good.