The Gulf Islands area has many opportunities for kayaking, using one of the islands as a starting point and paddling the bays, harbours, coastlines, and channels. We have paddled out of Saturna, Galiano, Cortez, and Salt Spring Islands, and recently out of the Pender Islands. With a short term decision to go to South Pender Island without our kayaks we opted to rent sea kayaks out of the Port Browning Marina (Pender Kayak Adventures) and confine our paddling explorations to protected areas. There is a narrow channel between North and South Pender Island so we combined the Port Browning Harbour with Bedwell Harbour, a total of 15 km of paddling without going into the open channels.
We were pleased to rent decent sea-going kayaks for a half day of exploration on the water.
By following the shoreline down to Shark Cove then through Pender Canal, were in Bedwell Harbour in 2 km.
South Pender Island is reasonably unspoiled and there were lots of birds and marine mammals to see.
We watched a sea otter swim through a bay and climb up the banks.
The eastern shores of Bedwelll Harbour are in Gulf Islands National Park. Trails could be spotted above the bluffs leading to Beaumont Marine campsite (we also hiked there the day after).
Beaumont Marine Campsite has 13 marine-access-only sites fronted to by a protected bay and beach.
We paddled for about 3 hours that day and we were so impressed by the area that we returned to hike all the trails of Mount Norman and Beaumont Marine the following day. We hope to return with our own kayaks to camp there as part of a marine journey, taking in Pender Island, Saturna Island, Prevost Island, and Wallace Island.
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