Haida Gwaii: Watchmen

A primary goal of our journey aboard the Island Solitude was to visit all five Watchmen sites within the Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve, National Marine Conservation Area, and Haida Heritage Site, usually referred to simply as Gwaii Haanas. I must provide some background history, compiled and condensed from various sources.

 

The Backstory

 

The sites lie within the territory of the Haida people, who have lived there for at least 14,000 years. Oral histories say the Haida lived in Gwaii Haanas when the first trees arrived; pollen samples indicate they arrived 14,500 years ago with the retreat of the Ice Age glaciation.

 

From the 1970s through the early 1980s, attempts to expand logging of the old-growth forest, including towering spruce, sparked the first efforts to protect Gwaii Haanas. In 1980, the Haida Nation launched a land claim with the Canadian government, asserting its title to the territory. Also, environmental activists proposed designating much of the archipelago as a protected wilderness, but neither the federal nor provincial government acted, and logging continued.

 

In the fall of 1985, a major forestry company planned to log a fifth of Haida Gwaii’s 60,000 acres of Crown land; the Haida worried that further logging could endanger the local salmon they had long relied on. In October, a Haida chief led a nonviolent blockade of a logging road. Over the next three months, the Haida community and its allies stood fast, even though seventy-two blockaders were arrested.

 

And the Haida succeeded. In 1987, logging ended when Canada and British Columbia signed the South Moresby Memorandum of Understanding. In 1993, Canada and the Haida Nation signed the Gwaii Haanas Agreement. In a decision released on March 31, 2025, the B.C. Supreme Court dismissed a final $75 million lawsuit brought by a logging company.

 

The Watchmen 

The Haida Gwaii Watchmen program encourages young Haida to work alongside elders to protect and teach visitors about Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve and Haida Heritage Site. Since the early 1990s, two to four Watchmen have been hired each summer to live at each of five sites, where they remain up to 4 months, acting as stewards of the historic sites and providing historical knowledge and tourist information to visitors. Our Story   A goal was to visit all five Watchmen sites during this voyage -- weather permitting. On the morning of May 25, 2025, we sailed from our anchorage at Moresby Camp to the Watchmen site Ḵ'uuna Llnagaay (Skedans). (Click on any image to enlarge.) All our landings were by zodiac. Here's a photo of the Island Solitude after getting ashore. Our watchmen at Skedans were this woman and her young daughter. White stones/shells mark the paths we're allowed to use. A glimpse of the watchmen cabin. This next photo is what remains of a plank house, a form of construction used by the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest. It is the foundation pit, with rows around the central ground. Our watchman told us it was mandatory to start and finish the digging in one day; otherwise, noise from spirits underground would make the site unusable. Here, an old potlatch pole is held up by one of the trees. Our watchman also introduced us to the traditional Haida moiety system. The Haida nation was divided into two moieties, the Raven and the Eagle. Marriages within the same moiety were prohibited; any children belonged to the mother's moiety, and within each moiety were several clans.   All too soon it was time to depart ... as the saying goes, "time and tide wait for no one." We walked back to the beach and boarded our zodiacs. This visit was a great introduction to Haida culture.   We sailed on, passing many islets. The afternoon began with zodiac cruising, checking out the living organisms in the tidal zones. A starfish under shallow water. Aren't zodiacs great? Later in the afternoon, we went ashore for a walk and for natural history. It's definitely a rainforest. A spruce stump, sporting a cut notch two-thirds of the way up. It was a foothold for the loggers cutting down the tree. A tree with a history ... A bonsai-ish colony atop a fallen tree! The Island Solitude waited patiently. Here's a photo from a large map that the captain and the guide marked up to show our journey. You can see our descent from the upper right (Skedans is off the map to the north) through channels to our anchorage #2, lower left, with a side trip to McEchran Cove -- likely the source of the above photos. Click on any image to enlarge. A very busy first day of the expedition! All the staff -- Captain Jeremy, Mate Theo, NatHab guide Eddy, and Carly the chef -- had proved to be fabulous.

Haida Gwaii: Arrival

Well, it's been a while since I posted -- but now, we're starting on Haida Gwaii.

 

On May 22nd, 2025, Joan and I flew to Vancouver, BC, to begin our Haida Gwaii adventure with Natural Habitat Adventures (NatHab). We spent the night at the airport hotel (Fairmont) due to airline schedules. The Vancouver airport was clean and pleasant, but has the helter-skelter layout of a facility that's long outgrown its origins. In one lobby, there is a sculpture, the Spirit of Haida Gwaii, honoring the indigenous culture of those islands. (Click on any image to enlarge.)

From Vancouver there's one daily flight in the early afternoon to Sandspit, the landing strip on Moresby Island, where our NatHab guide met us. Travel tip: if you can't find your passport, lift the seat cushion you've been sitting on. It could be under there.

 

Now we were at 53° north, give or take a smidge.

That evening we walked from our neat but modest lodgings to an in-home restaurant, the first in Canada to be allowed to forage for wild ingredients, including herbs and other ingredients buried in the backyard to age.

Some of us glimpsed a black bear moseying through the back lot.

The next day, we took the ferry to Graham Island, a (long) stone's throw north of Moresby.

Our first stop was grocery shopping for the expedition. The signs were bilingual, one side in English and the other in Haida; Northern Haida (X̱aayda Kil) is spoken around Masset, and Southern Haida (X̱aad Kil) around Skidegate and the southern islands.

Next, we visited the Haida Heritage Center, at Ḵay 'Llnagaay. Photography is not allowed inside the museum, but outdoor exhibits are fair game.

Very tall totem facing the sea; note the tables and figures near the bottom of this photo.

Canoes, cut out of a single tree, were how the Haida and other indigenous groups in the region traveled, for long distances -- more here.

This mask allowed the dancer to transform from a raven to a human by pulling a cord.

The indoor portions of the museum were fascinating, including geology (Ice Ages!), history, and culture (bentwood baskets). As you might expect, some aspects were tragic, including the European introduction of smallpox (likely deliberately), which reduced the population to as low as 600.

 

After we visited the museum, we drove to the Spirit Lake trailhead (GuuhlGa Siiwaay K'yuu).

The walk offers glimpses of many birds, such as eagles, and significant plants, including devil's club and culturally modified trees.

The trail was rehabilitated in 2021 and 2022, but there's still a warning about one bridge.

From the lake we drove, bumps and all, down old logging roads to reach the embarkation point for our sailing.

Just offshore was the Island Solitude, our remarkably comfy home for the next several days. Zodiacs carried generous provisions aboard, and then ferried us over.

Orientation, unpacking, and dinner followed. Our "expedition" had begun. 

Quebec Whales and Trails, Part 5: Grand-Jardins National Park

On September 23rd, 2023,  our NatHab group departed from the Manoir Richelieu hotel for an hour-long drive into the Grand-Jardins National Park. (Click on any image to enlarge.)

This park suffered a severe burn in 1999, which consumed much of the ground we will cover this day. How will it look 24 years later?

Before reaching the visitor center, we stopped at a viewpoint and spotted a black bear wandering away in the distance.

At the center were exhibits, a picnic ground, and so forth. I took a photo of this map,

and of this negative-silhouette artwork. Note the second, positive-silhouette caribou in the distance, seen through the cutoff of the immediate one.

We set off to hike in this recovering area. Things to investigate and identify included scat,

and baby trees.

We ventured downhill and passed by a stream, encountering mosses and lichens.

Our turnaround point was a lake with an old cabin, a pit toilet, and a few canoes. Here we lingered for a while.

We wound our way back up a gentle slope.

An intersection for more distant destinations.

There were plenty of places to visit, had we several days to explore.

All too soon, it was time to depart. A long drive lay ahead to reach Manoir du Lac Delage, our home for the next two nights. Our route ran through the outskirts of Quebec City and then headed north.

We stopped for some souvenir and refreshment opportunities along the way. Here our guides, Julia and Jackie, show off some plunder.

The Manoir du Lac Delage sprawls across an immense property, enabling it to host weddings and other events. This is a view from the "back yard."

Joan admired the sunset from the floating dock at the lake.

Tomorrow, our final day of exploration here in Quebec, we'll explore the Jacques-Cartier National Park.

Quebec Whales and Trails: Part 4, Parc National des Hautes-Gorges-de-la-Rivière-Malbaie

On September 22, 2023, our NatHab group explored the Parc National des Hautes-Gorges-de-la-Rivière-Malbaie. The first stop, roughly an hour northwest from our hotel, was a hike to a viewpoint. We disembarked from our bus on the far side of the river Malbaie. (Click on any image to enlarge.)

The river appeared quite tannic at this time of year.

We're taking the red dots for an out-and-back.

The first section was a stroll along a gravel road.

After a while, we reached a true trailhead.

In English, "Maple Grove Trail"

We passed by some fascinating (reindeer) lichen, a token of clean air.

In closeup.

Pollution-sensitive bony-beard lichen dangled, flourishing, from some trees.

It wasn't long before we arrived at the viewpoint.

Our guides, Julia and Jackie encouraged us to spend a few minutes in quiet contemplation, with cliffs ahead and water below.

Then we retraced our steps and reunited with our bus and driver. It was only a short drive to the visitors center next to an old dam, originally built for logging, and picnic tables, canoe rentals, etc. Lunch was our first order of business!

An overview of the area. Click to enlarge.

The cliffs above the Malbaie are among the tallest rock faces east of the Rockies.

The watercraft zone is marked off above the dam.

Here is a zoom-in map showing the shorter hikes and the watercraft area.

Joan and I trod the shorter loops/climbs, which included an open-air viewing shelter (not much bird activity at this time of year) and some rough trail sections that we managed to navigate, but would have deterred casual walkers. In this photo, we're peering down towards the footbridge and dam.

Then we decided to hike upstream alongside the watercraft playground. After several bends in the river, we spotted the aquatic portion of our group, still happily paddling around, and decided to return to the visitor's center; we seemed to have enough time to explore the trail on the west bank below the dam. The dam itself hosted exhibits about the logging activity. The cut trees would be corralled (manhandled) into rafts that would float downstream to the mills. Today, those waters look like this.

We explored the trail on the west bank. The Malbaie supports many critters, including owls, as evidenced by the rain-washed pellets we took to Julia and Jackie for examination.

Photo of specimens in situ.

The foam patterns on the dark river were intriguing.

Joan and I then recrossed the bridge just in time to board the bus, and, well satisfied, our group returned to the Fairmont in La Malbaie.

Tomorrow, we'll explore the Grands-Jardins National Park, a core element of the Charlevoix Biosphere Reserve, and move to a new hotel.