Self-Drive Family Adventure in British Columbia

Thirteen nights across British Columbia, self-guided, from Vancouver to Tofino by way of three off-grid nights on the mainland coast, arranged for a family.

Klahoose Wilderness Resort is the part that makes this itinerary. It is off-grid, owned and run by the Klahoose First Nation on the edge of the Great Bear Rainforest, and reached by two ferries and a transfer rather than a road.

Vancouver opens it for two nights, with Stanley Park and the Granville Island market. The Sea-to-Sky Highway follows to Whistler for four, with a stop at Squamish, a family canoe safari through lily-covered glacier-fed lakes and a picnic, and e-bikes, cedar forest walks or riding in the alpine meadows available. Klahoose comes next for three nights, with boat trips into Desolation Sound and Toba Inlet looking for orca, humpbacks and bears, cedar weaving with Klahoose hosts, kayaking and ocean foraging, campfire evenings and bioluminescent plankton in the water after dark. Tofino closes the route, with a kayak trip to Meares Island and the Big Tree Trail among cedars a thousand years old.

The accommodation throughout including the three Klahoose nights, the family canoe safari with lunch, a coastal bear excursion, the Meares Island kayak trip and the ferry crossings are all included; international flights, the rental car, the optional Whistler activities and surf lessons are not. The price shown is per person excluding flights. No wildlife sighting can be promised. June to September is the window for all of it, when the ferries run often and the Tofino weather is at its kindest. Fourteen days with four nights at Whistler and three at Klahoose keeps the moves down to four, which for a family trip of this length is about right.