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Westcoast Weather
We are hard pressed to encounter four distinct seasons on the Westcoast of Vancouver Island. One just sort of runs into the other. There is an obvious change from Summer to Winter though neither are heralded by notable extremes. The Summers are comfortably warm and the winter seasons seldom below freezing. We usually have snow at the higher elevations making all types of skiing available, as well as snow shoeing and camping. Our Fall Winter Spring season is noted for some pretty good rainfalls which provides the climate for our rainforests, water for salmon to spawn and us to canoe on.
Fog can be with us Summer or Winter and presents a very real threat to the unprepared for hypothermia. Often a fog bank will drift, or be blown in, onto the coast drenching hikers and firewood alike and changing what started out as a blue sky hike into a very uncomfortable or even fatal misadventure.
Similarly, this fog can wreak havoc with those not familiar with local sea conditions. Suffice it to say that wind, fog and rain, tides and maelstrom like currents can rise up in a quarter of an hour to being most hazardous.
That is not to say that our paradise on the southern Westcoast of Vancouver Island is inhospitable. Far from it! We enjoy by far the mildest winters in Canada and a comfortably ocean moderated summer. Precipitation varies on the coast. Records show rainfalls of an inch an hour in one area and 5 miles away scarcely a tenth of that. From October to April expect rain or snow, or even the odd colder snap of clear and perhaps 10 degrees of frost. May to September temperatures range from the teens Celsius to mid thirties. That’s about 60 –90 Fahrenheit for you-all who may use it.
Wilderquest guides are weather-wise and prepare for weather vagaries and how they may affect river conditions, hiking and camping set-ups and destination access and egress.
Currently conditions at the Wilderquest Resort are; the hot tubs are hot, the cabins are warm with one small fire reported in the woodstove. Enjoy your day.
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