Juan de Fuca Trail Hiking Trip

Juan de Fuca trail map

I spent the past weekend hiking the Juan de Fuca trail on the west coast of Vancouver Island.  My good friend Matt and I hiked from China beach to Sombrio beach, a total of 28 kms.  The weekend was a long one due to the new BC Family Day holiday, so we spent Saturday through Monday doing the hike.

We had imagined hiking the first 20km in the first day, but with a 40lb pack on each of our backs we were perhaps a little over ambitious.  In the end we casually hiked 10km on the first day, from China to Bear beach.  Bear beach featured awesome views, some sun, a couple beers and a slightly disappointing campfire.  The following day we hiked another 10km from Bear to Chin beach.  This leg of the trail is known as the toughest and contained many ascents and descents.  After this tough leg we arrived at Chin beach and had a good rest and were fortunate to have a great fire on this night. The last day took us from Chin to Sombrio beach, a less challenging leg of the trail which contained many interesting obstacles, (eg. ropes, log bridges, log staircases!)

We arrived a Sombrio beach around midday and I was awestruck at the power of the ocean at Sombrio.  Numerous whirlpools, huge crashing waves, rock beaches relentlessly swept by huge waves and waterfalls.  As we were descending to Sombrio I heard screams up ahead, which I assumed to be surfers having some fun.  As I turned a corner coming down I discovered Matt had taken a tumble after breaking one of his trekking poles.  The two screams I heard when approaching the scene were: 1; Matt taking the fall and 2; Matt relocating his patella (kneecap) back into place!  Fortunately we were close to the end of the trail and Matt was able to walk out.  It was a sad end to this awesome trip and I am hoping Matt makes a speedy recovery.