Gina and Conrad have arrived in Canada and for their first few days they organised a sea kayaking trip, which is something that neither of us had done before, so we joined them.

To get to the Broken Group Islands, which is where our 3 day sea kayaking introduction would take place, we needed to take two ferries from Vancouver and several hours drive.

There were 6 of us – Sharon and I, Gina & Conrad, Conrad's sister Claire and their friend, Sarah whose been living out here for 6 months – and we'd hired out 3 double sea kayaks for the adventure. The plan was to see lots of animals and it started well with Gina spotting what she thought was a black dog through her binoculars on the ferry over to the Broken Group. However she had spotted her first black bear over here. Later on a guy from a diving school spotted a whale, and we also saw lots of jumping fish in the water. While waiting for the kayaks to be ready, we saw a jellyfish and lots of starfish including a giant one.

The wildlife we saw included: humpback whales, deer, a river otter, seals, sea lions, mink, porpoises, more tiny jumping fish, bald eagles, slimy gigantic slugs, and lots and lots of starfish of all colours suggesting the 90 species may not be an overestimation. We also saw tracks along a beach which were rather large and very wolf like – however we didn't get to see what made them – I was hoping to hear one howl but no such luck. The whale put on a great show and we saw him bring his head out of the water – it was very impressive. There were other birds that we saw but unfortunately our bird identification isn't quite up to speed yet.

The scenery was wonderful too. It was great to do something different, but we're looking forward to getting back to some rivers now.

Photos will be posted soon.

Sharon and David.

P.S. Thanks to everyone who sent stuff on the Chocolate Express (aka Conrad and Gina's flight), it's great to have loads of English goodies & especially loverly to have cards to open on my (David's) birthday.)