in today's video we continue our road trip across Vancouver Island and
partnership with trover this time visiting three towns in the northern
part of the island where we have lots of cool nature sightings and also come
across some rather unusual attractions first up we visited Port Hardy where we
casually encountered a bald eagle locals were very calm about this occurrence but
the three of us were standing by the water's edge
cooling and eyeing at the display then in Port McNeill that we came across the
biggest burl in the world we didn't even know what a burl was up until her visit
but we'll tell you guys all about it soon enough and finally we hit up the
picturesque seaside village of telegraph cove where we learned all about killer
whales and came face to face with two deer who seemed blissfully unaware of
her presence it was a great day and we can't wait to share it all with you in
this video
good morning from Port Alice it is a new day it is a cloudy day but it feels
pretty nice out it feels cool fresh it's a very small town here okay I don't
think there is more than a thousand people population in this place there is
a water right here behind us a lot of small houses and something that caught
our attention is that in front of each house there is a small fishing boat so I
guess fishing here must be amazing if you have all the households with a boat
at the doorsteps there the garage that means that they use it and today the
plan is to try and visit three towns that are fairly close together we have
Port Hardy Port McNeill Telegraph Cove there are small towns but they have
unusual attractions well let's get in the car and let's get started get
driving
so we just stopped here on the side of the road we're about four kilometers
outside of Port Hardy but we wanted to take a picture with the town sign and
while we were snapping a photo we also noticed this giant blade it's like what
do they call the windmill windmill the middle blade yeah then we started
reading a little bit about the Cape Scott wind project that apparently
provides electricity for several communities here one of them being
port alice where we're staying right now we're port hardly port McNeill and port alice
oh wow yeah the communities get the electricity the energy from that wind
farm that is located right here and you've got a wind farm 55 turbines each
Blaine is 49 meters in length 7.5 tons of weight on when this the whole thing
is assembled the windmill is assembled you got 80 meters and the circumference
around all the tree blades is 100 meters big baby huh yeah yeah so this one was
damaged when they were building the wind farm this one was damaged beyond repair
so the town started like a petition to have it you know mounted here on display
and also to help raise more awareness about green energy in this area so
that's what it is now onwards to Port Hardy let's go this probably seems like
a bit of a random roadside stop but they also had giant info boards with tourist
information on each of the surrounding communities and nearby islands so it
turned out to be a good place to get some ideas of things to do in the area
well guys we're here in Port Hardy down by the beach there was a huge commotion
a few moments to go because there was a salmon a fish already dead floating on
the water's edge and these birds were going crazy the seagulls
now they've quieted down because they ate the whole thing but at one point
this Eagle this bald eagle swooped down and scared them all away it was also
trying to like catch fish yeah it was amazing we saw a bald eagle and we were
not planning to see one of those but yeah there is another one up there and
you see you may wonder why the name bald eagle when bald is someone that has no
hair oh just right over to the yes you're telling us about the meaning
about the meaning of the name bald you know bald is someone with no hair right
bald eagle you mean like an eagle with no feathers but actually the name ball
comes from the old English language when bald meant white so in the old all old
days when they first came here the settlers and they saw this magnificent
bird and they saw dye has white the head that's why they called it bald eagle you
know the white eagle it's just perched atop a tree just
watching the horizon I think if we stay here a little bit longer she's fishing
action she's fishing a few minutes ago she was going to catch a fish and the
water there probably a salmon or something like that but at the last
minute it looks like the fish went deep and she aborted the word demission
demission we almost almost that close of capturing
on film when it's that moment fishing yeah that's another so now that piece of
wildlife that we are seeing and we are not doing too bad ya know so far so good
we're we're we're hoping for a cougar yeah and an elk now if we see those two
anyway all the checkmarks are gonna be look at
this guy hi there so yeah let's keep on with the
expedition and we'll bring you along of course the bald eagle encounter pretty
much made our visit to Port Hardy we then walked along the waterfront where
we spotted a curious seal peeping its head out of the water plus we saw some
impressive totems it was a short visit but we really enjoyed the town
from there we continued our drive towards Port McNeill but we pull down a
logging road just shy of the town to visit rather unique attraction this
right here is a burl a burl is a knotty growth on a tree that can occur on the
trunk at the base of the tree or even underground in the form of a rounded
growth it's the result of stress on the tree due to injury of fungus or an
insect infestation so we are on the outskirts of Port McNeill we just pulled
off on this little logging road here and we have discovered the world's largest
burl so basically it was a spruce burl and when they found this it was
basically a 350 year old spruce tree that was seventy nine point
six meters in height and 1.8 meters in diameter so you can imagine just how
wide it was the weight of the burl now listen to this twenty thousand three
hundred and sixty one kilograms so I mean he imagined the size of that thing
we also noticed to preserve the burl they've got like some kind of a
fiberglass coating or something on the top when you're gonna see the video or a
picture it doesn't look real no because it has a fiberglass coating to protect
it if you like quirky attractions this one is worth the detour we added this
place to trover and included detailed directions to help you guys get there
since it is down a dirt road just outside the Talon we then drove into
Port McNeill to have a little wander around town and check out the marina
yeah we made it we made it it's only about 20-25 minutes away from Port Hardy
yeah it was just a short drive yeah and all of a sudden the Sun has come out it
is sunny once more yeah different kinds of towns but uh
feels a bit small this one feels smaller it's a little quieter feels a little
more remote and uh I like it here behind us we have tons of fishing boats the
harbor we have the harbor and we've also got the ferry terminal here which I
think we're gonna be making use of in the next few days to go to alert Bay BC
Ferries and Sountula - yes - lies the village I believe I
believe that song Malcolm Island yeah we can't wait to do that in fact we're
probably gonna do that tomorrow but for the time being I think we're just gonna
walk around the marina here soak in the Sun the weather is just incredible at
the moment and yeah just enjoyed this kind of chilled port vibe that we're that
we have here in Port McNeill
have you already chosen your favorite boat my dad has I like the big tugboat
over there oh the tugboat yeah your aren't even after a sail it's called the
new masked warrior I'm going for the most robust one here in the heart
alright anyways we've got another place to go visit we are going to telegraph
cove and that's an even smaller town yeah when I was reading information
about this town it said that it has 20 inhabitants :
yeah maybe some of them look maybe some of the people who work there actually
live here so it's not that far from here yeah I can't wait to go see it I think
it's gonna be so scenic
we continue to drive towards telegraph cove which may very well be the most
picturesque town we visited during our whole Vancouver Island Road trip
Telegraph cove started out as a fishing in cannery village but today it's an eco
tourism destination where you can embark on a number of adventures including
kayaking trips whale watching excursions and even grizzly bear tours
alright guys so we are taking a little break at the killer whale cafe it is 3
o'clock time for tea cake coffee a little mid-afternoon pick me up
I'm having a cup of tea cozy a cappuccino for me Sam ordered a monster
cake that he's not planning to share no I'm getting the chocolate peanut butter
cheesecake good shots of shots of the cake must film the cake before he eats
it why so what do you have there guys I'm in heaven at the moment I have an
enormous cappuccino and I wasn't gonna get a drink but when I saw your
cappuccino I'm like I rather get one too so big that is now the greedy part about
what's going on here is I have peanut butter and chocolate cheesecake and it
looks like it's been - rizal this with caramel sauce - guys how's that
Sam has been talking about the killer whale cafe for days so I'm glad you're
cute I didn't I didn't know they had such a good cakes but yeah so decadent
mm-hmm and I think after this we're gonna go visit the killer whale
interpretive center just around the corner yeah I think yep oh good
cappuccino - I got my happy place my cup of tea yeah it was about red rose speed
yeah they served it to the Queen and they advertise until they serve it to
the Queen and she was amazed by this tea and she says get it and the butler says
mom sold only in Canada and the Queen says after a little mid-afternoon treat
we walked over to the whale interpretive center which was founded in 2002 and
seeks to raise public awareness about marine mammals and the threats they face
the whale interpretive center is home to one of the best collections of marine
mammal skeletons in British Columbia and their exhibits include a killer whale
sperm whale river otter sea otter Pacific white-sided dolphin harbor seal
and more here we learned that each killer whale pod has their own dialect
of sounds they even had audio recordings so we were able to listen to what the
various pods around Vancouver Island sound like it was very cool of course we
added this place to trover because it's a must visit if you make it out to
Telegraph Cove
final stop of the day was Telegraph cove would you guys think of it very nice
yeah very picturesque yes yeah yeah they've they've kept it like the way it
was in the beginning and this this place okay these all the houses are not
occupied right now they look nice from the
exterior but this kind of like a tourist attraction right yeah they're not family
homes anymore it's more like a tour operator each house has like a little
information section telling who used to live here what they did where they were
from it's it's a very nice place to visit if you are ever around these
latitudes so you know take a drive and come and visit and you will not be
disappointed no yeah it feels like the time is spending still yeah did you guys
enjoy the museum it's funny because here all of a sudden you know we're talking
or filming a clip and also what is that suspend the whole day
the wildlife is everywhere we've seen as much as we wanted to see and beyond what
we were expecting to see when it comes to wildlife Yeah right
okay let's go
we didn't hike more than five minutes before we had a surprise two deer
munching on shrubs and bushes they were just a few meters away from us
and their little snack must have been very tasty because they didn't even look
up at us
and that's it for today's adventure on Vancouver Island in the next episode we
take the ferry over to alert Bay where we discover the meaning behind totem
poles at the Nagas original burial ground we learn about the gift-giving
tradition known as a potlatch at the you mystic cultural center and we also come
across the world's largest totem pole directly outside the big house all that
and more in the next episode so we'll see you soon