Watch, learn and wonder while sailing B.C.’s Inside Passage | Canada Voices

Do not, we were warned, go below deck if you’re feeling queasy.

Much better to be up top, in the wheelhouse, where ocean air and the sight of the horizon trick your mind and body into getting used to being at sea.

And so it was that I found myself banging through rolling swells on a sailboat in Queen Charlotte Strait, blessedly not seasick, singing along to a sea shanty playlist and feeling, ever so fleetingly, that I could get used to being a sailor.

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Of course, that feeling was only possible for a landlubber like me because someone else was minding the ship: that person being captain Ashley MacKinnon and the ship being the Ocean Wayfinder, a 21-metre ketch (two-masted ship) that’s now sailing with Outer Shores.

Founded in 2012 by marine ecologist Russell Markel, Outer Shores offers ecotourism expeditions to British Columbia destinations, including the Great Bear Rainforest, Haida Gwaii and the southern Gulf Islands.

With the introduction of the Ocean Wayfinder, the company’s original ship – the Passing Cloud, a 21-metre wooden schooner designed by naval architect William Roué of Bluenose fame – is being retrofitted for research trips and private expeditions. Ocean Wayfinder, meanwhile, is intended to take on the lion’s share of guest voyages, with future plans including potential new itineraries to the west coast of Vancouver Island or southeast Alaska.

What won’t change, however, is the company’s focus on marine conservation, through trips that invite travellers to watch, learn and wonder.

“Conservation comes down to people’s values and helping people see and connect with nature,” Markel says in a phone conversation after my trip.

“And it changes the way they see the world.”

The view from the Ocean Wayfinder is indeed a world away from the one you’d get from the floating resorts that cruise the Inside Passage to Alaska. Built in 1984 as a private yacht, the ship has six guest cabins, two crew cabins and three shared heads, or bathrooms. We were travelling with nine passengers and four crew.

There’s no spa or tennis court, but there are two Zodiacs for shore trips, four kayaks for paddling and an onboard library stuffed with books on plants, marine life and Indigenous art. There’s a manual for whale identification, which we scour when we spot humpback whales, including Inukshuk, a local icon known for his daytime singing.

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We were on what Outer Shores calls a migration journey, essentially a repositioning cruise during which the Ocean Wayfinder travels from its home anchorage on Vancouver Island to its summer base near Bella Bella. The migration trip is split into three legs. I was on board in late May for the third and final leg, sailing from Port McNeill to Bella Bella.

Because we were on the clock to get to Bella Bella, we didn’t have much time to sail. But one sunny afternoon, the captain cut the engines, the mizzen and genoa sails were unfurled and we sailed, lazing sunstruck on the outer deck like the Steller sea lions we’d passed earlier in the trip.

Over four nights and five days, you get to know each other. Crew members were good-humoured and unflappable, equipped to deal with challenges that might go unseen on a larger ship, like a balky anchor stuck in the hold or a generator seemingly on the fritz (fixed after a few hours of troubleshooting).

Captain MacKinnon steered us through occasional choppy seas while managing to spot wildlife, identify landmarks and lead a forest walk on which we saw grizzly bear footprints, but alas, no bears. (Bear and other wildlife sightings are practically guaranteed on the company’s marquee trips to the Great Bear Rainforest and Haida Gwaii.)

However, we did see scores of sea otters, which were nearly wiped during the colonial fur trade but have been making a comeback along the B.C. coast since being reintroduced from Alaska in the late 1960s.

We spot them as singles, in pairs, then floating on their backs.

Fellow travellers included an oilman and keen photographer from Houston, who said he’d been on about 20 trips over the past two decades along the B.C. coast, nearly all with B.C. nature photographer and guide Brad Hill.

Hill was also on this trip, en route to Great Bear Rainforest, where he would lead a photography group on the Ocean Wayfinder’s next eight-day tour.

One woman, who will turn 80 later this year and lives in Portland, said the expedition was a birthday gift to herself. She pitched the notion of sailboats, whales and the B.C. coast to her Illinois-based brother and sister-in-law, who gamely agreed to join her on the adventure.

We bond over meals featuring B.C. fish, delicate pastries and the best risotto I have ever eaten, spirited out of a tiny galley by head chef Courtenay Kohlhauser.

In keeping with its conservation focus, Outer Shores last year set up a non-profit arm to fund research and conservation projects on the B.C. coast through a $200-a-guest surcharge.

The company is also involved in a research project into ocean hypoxia – a side effect of warming oceans that can essentially strangle marine ecosystems – in which all seven members of the Small Ship Tour Operators Association of B.C. are using specialized instruments to measure oxygen levels in waters along the central and northern coasts.

I ask Markel about the risks to the coast from increased tourism, even by relatively low-impact operations such as small ship tours. The sector is small and tightly-regulated, he responds, with oversight from the provincial and federal governments as well as protocol agreements with First Nations in the region.

Meanwhile, there’s growing recognition of what’s at stake; this past May, the B.C. and federal governments, along with six First Nations, announced a new national marine conservation area on the central coast, calling it “one of the richest marine environments in the world.” It is also an Indigenous Protected and Conserved Area.

From my perch in the wheelhouse of the Ocean Wayfinder, I get to see glimpses of that wealth on display, from a humpback mother with her calf to sea otters popping by as if to say hello.

They look completely and utterly at home.

If you go

Bring the best outdoor gear you can buy or borrow. The ship provides rubber boots and top-notch rain gear, but on cool mornings, I was glad for every layer I packed.

Outer Shores runs expeditions to the Great Bear Rainforest, Haida Gwaii, North Vancouver Island and the southern Gulf Islands. Prices vary but 2026 fall trips to the Great Bear Rainforest start at $8,950.

Starting points for Outer Shores trips include Sandspit on Haida Gwaii, Bella Bella on the central coast (both accessible by commercial flights), and Port McNeill on Vancouver Island (commercial flights available to nearby Port Hardy).

Special to The Globe and Mail

The writer was a guest of Outer Shores, which did not review or approve this article. Stories are based on merit; The Globe does not guarantee coverage.