Canada - rockies or vancouver island?

[User7777]

Am about to book a holiday with my 16 yo ds, but can't decide whether to go for vancouver issuance or the rockies. We will Airbnb and drive, and really want to see wildlife.
Pros For the rockies are that we've never been to a mountain range. I've heard it's amazing. But, I also hear its busy. and also obviously no whale watching tours.
But VI doesn't seem to have the range of wildlife of the rockies. Everything I've seen is focused on the marine life.
I'm already wondering if you can get tours to get a glimpse of the animals, or is it more by chance. Wed love to see cougars, wolves, bears, moose, coyotes etc
Any advice is welcome.

To help you make a choice, I suggest you look at all the options listed at www.wildlifeworldwide.com for Canada. They are wildlife specialists and have great info.

We like whales. We also like bears. VI has both. You can see whales off Vancouver so you could do that first and then go into the Rockies. I haven’t been to the Rockies but I have been on a small boat trip to the Great Bear Rainforest. We saw 1 wolf. That was very lucky and our guide knew where the wolf might be. Cougar? I think you would need luck. We’ve seen moose in Alaska. One wolf in Alaska too. Plenty of whales and bears though. So seeing everything in your list might be difficult. However do a bit more research with WW and see what you think.

I can also tell you this summer is very booked up. We are going to Alaska on a small boat out of Prince Rupert and there’s only one date still available. We intended to get the ferry from PR to VI, but accommodation we liked on VI was limited.

Thanks, that's really useful. I was wondering if we'd have to book a guide to see some of the animals.
Allso thought it might be quite booked up already. We are not first about accommodation, but do you think tours / guides would be booked up already too?

I think wildlife tours (day tours) need a lot of Google searching. We always use wildlife specialist lodges and tour companies (as above). It’s just easier for us to do this. I’ve never considered wildlife tours using my own base. However I would start by looking at VI by using the bases used by WW. Then you know what you can see in each place. Booking whale/orca trips is easy but you would need to research bear viewing in my opinion. There are salmon run rivers where bears catch salmon in late summer, but they are remote. The lodges that specialise in viewings are really expensive. However you need to see if independent guides can help by researching in the prime bear viewing areas.

You won’t see any of these animals - you might hear coyotes, and possibly see moose. You’ll see deer, but not much else. The Rockies is t a place, it’s a mountain range that runs down Canada and USA. Different parts of the rockies look different!
We’ve been to Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Vancouver Island several times. Had some guided tours, but never seen those things - we’ve seen whales the 2 times we went in whale watching tours - both times we went from Vancouver Island. We also saw sea otters when we stayed on Vancouver Island in an air BNB on the beach at a place called Souke.

We flew into Calgary and drove via Banff and Lake Louise to Jasper on day 1, and saw bears on the side of the road, wandering past our car, that very first day. Happened again on day 2 just outside Jasper! And Elk were bathing in a lake that we went swimming in.

Vancouver island is a fab place to visit though, and Victoria is great, so I'd recommend that too! There are loads of whale watching tours on offer from Victoria.

@Soontobe60
There are bears on VI but you need to stay at the right places to see them. When you do, there are plenty to see in salmon run rivers.

How long are you going for? Can you do both? Tons to do on the drive in between ☺️

On VI we have bears (black & brown no grizzles on the island). I live in sooke and have bears, cougars & wolves frequent my back yard. Not sure you could book a tour to see them, they are wild so no guarantees where they will be. You can go to grouse mountain on the mainland and seen them but they are in enclosures there not wild. Whale watching is fabulous. Lots of places on the island to visit if you like hiking I would definitely recommend heading to tofino/ uculet area. Botanical Beach up by Port Renfrew is amazing. By luck the last time we went there we saw a mama bear with 2 cubs & lots of eagles. Bears can be spotted at various rivers around salmon run time but that's usually around November time. Parksville is great for a seaside type breaks lots of great resorts there my favorite is tigh Mara.

I thought it doing both but thought it'd be better to see one properly.
Onesail, you are making me want to go there even more!

I saw a bear near Tofino on VI just wondering down the road. 🐻

Vancouver Island. But don't just stay in Victoria, move around and do a circuit. Even if you can't do a circuit of the whole island doing a circuit of South/west part would still bring you an incredible variety of experiences.

There are black bears and brown bears on VI. I think there are tours looking for brown bears at right time of year in Campbell River area. I think there may also be tours looking for wolves in that area but not sure.

You can definitely see black bears on south/west of island - there are boat trips that take you out from Tofino/Ucluelet when the bears are along the shore (timing depends on tides). And I saw black bears by the side of the road just driving about in that area (near Long Beach?).

Plus sea otters, puffins, bald eagles and deer without really trying.

Then whales. Orca from Victoria, grey whales from Tofino/Ucluelet.

There are elk on the island as I recall.

Consider taking binoculars. All the responsible operators keep a distance from the animals so as not to disturb or harm them. It's still exciting and wonderful without binoculars, but if you think you will want to use them it will be nice to have.

And the beaches and ancient gigantic trees (humbling). And loads of cultural stuff and museums.

Magical sounds twee but it's the word that comes to mind for VI.

Oh and snakes. I also saw a snake when I was hiking on VI.

Further north, the salmon run is much earlier. Great Bear Rainforest is August/Sept. Boats cease operating by mid October.

I meant to add: the difference is casual spotting of bears or actually watching them for a long time in their habitat from a zodiac or hide. You will pay a lot for that but it’s very memorable and pretty much guaranteed.

If it helps your research, just refreshed my memory on names of some of the places I was referring to but couldn't remember while I was typing:

Cathedral Grove (ancient trees)
Pacific Rim National Park Reserve's Rainforest Hike (ancient trees)
Wild Pacific Trail
Paradise Meadows and Mount Washington (wonderful)

These plus some others are here (with lovely enticing photos):

www.planetware.com/canada/top-rated-hiking-trails-on-vancouver-island-bc-cdn-1-169.htm

Loving the recommendations. It's helping my planning. When I first started looking into it, I just didn't realise how huge Canada was. Even vancouver island is huge!

Is vancouver island typically less booked up than in the rockies?

The island is BUSY in the summer. I would start looking at options sooner rather than later. Just a word of caution. If you come to the island you may never want to leave !!😁. There is something about it draws you in & calls you back. My kids have told me if I ever move back home they are not coming.

[quote TizerorFizz]@Soontobe60
There are bears on VI but you need to stay at the right places to see them. When you do, there are plenty to see in salmon run rivers.[/quote]
Yes, I know, but those places are eye wateringly expensive to stay, and the bears are only viewable at certain times of the year.

It’s busy! As I said we were intending to get the ferry from Prince Rupert in July but could not stay where we wanted to. We decided to book in the future - early!

However a quick google shows there are day tours for bear watching. Tofino and Pacific Rim park.

The island will be manic. It’s also very expensive for accommodation and the ferry is also expensive and a nightmare.

On the wildlife front you don’t want to see half those animals. Black bears are common enough but you can’t really go looking for one. And you don’t want to see a brown bear. Ditto cougars, the only time you would see one in the wild is if it was being aggressive to you and was showing itself.

If you want to see wildlife I’d suggest just getting out and walking wherever you are in BC and you will see it. Plenty of beaches and lakes in BC have nesting bald eagles and seals etc. Orca are fairly common from boats but occasionally swim up into the areas closer to the shore.

By the Rockies I’m guessing you mean Banff but that’s 8-10 hours drive easy. If you want the best of both I’d suggest Vancouver and Whistler, scenery is wonderful and Whistler is a lot easier to get to than the Island. Bears are everywhere up there (black ones) as well as some of the other wildlife you want to see.

Fly to Vancouver for the city experience for a few days. Whale watch from there.. Drive out to the Rockies with a few days stopover halfway in the Okanagen, hot weather, vineyards and lakes. Carry onto the Rockies stopping in different places for a few days to explore and visit glaciers, lakes and mountain walks; Banff, then Icefields parkway and Jasper. Loop back via the scenic route to stop off in Whistler and back to Vancouver or finish in Calgary.

We saw elk, moose, a shit tonne of bears and mountain lions in the Rockies.

We stayed in a range of different types of places, Airbnbs, Cabins, Vineyard rooms, Motels, Hotels, cabins in campgrounds etc and was lovely moving on to the next place and a new adventure. We booked late too and there was plenty available if you are willing to research and use a range of platforms and book direct.

Agree VI is magical, have been a few times to visit family. Lots of eagles and deer. Saw a raccoon on one of the smaller islands. At Paradise Meadows there are Whiskey Jacks (birds) that will eat out of your hand. There is also a small wild animal sanctuary near Coombs. The scenery from the ferry at Horseshoe Bay to Nanaimo is spectacular.

This is the bear watching trip I did. I enjoyed it and would recommend them:

www.tofinowhalecentre.com/bear-watching