I am writing this looking out over the Pacific Ocean. It is rolling in, in that majestic way the Pacific has.

You may imagine cocktails and bikinis. You would be wrong. If you know me at all you would imagine mocktails and a one piece, with sun hat. But even that would be way off the mark.

And that is because I am on Cox Bay, near Tofino, on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada. And so it is raining. And I am on day 8ish (I think it is Saturday, but what do I know?) of a just over 2 week holiday.

When Youngest decided to go to Vancouver to study and play football (sorry soccer), having holidays in Canada was one of the attractions.

One of my best and oldest friends (who happens to also be Youngest’s godmother) has Canada on her bucket list.

Youngest gets a reading week in mid February. And so there we had it, a perfect excuse for a girls’ road trip.

It has been many hours in the planning. Much travel book reading (for we are old), on line searching, hotel booking, itinerary plannning. And so 8ish days ago we arrived.

Going on holiday in Canada in February causes some issues for those not wishing to drive in tyre chains and who are not keen on snow based winter activities. So we had settled on Vancouver Island, which is mild and wet and has rain forest.

This involves a car ferry from Vancouver to the island, of about 1 hour 45 mins.

One thing you should know about me is that I do not do boats. I get sea sick on a lake. When I was a child travel sickness was my main weakness, once, in the manner of Guiness world records, vomiting 11 times on a car trip from Formby, near Liverpool, to Kent. This was before the M25 was built, but nevertheless impressive.

Even today I would rather drive than be driven, especially round Milton Keynes, that hell of roundabouts.

So I had some trepidations about the ferry. Both from a sickness perspective. But also from a driving a hire car on the wrong side of the road and indeed wrong side of the car, into and back out of a ferry, whilst ferrying youngest, the mother of all back seat drivers perspective.

I needn’t have worried. The loading and sailing, and subsequent departing was smooth. This was unfortunate in one quite important way.

A few days later, and still somewhat cockahoop from the placid ferry crossing, we decided to book a whale watching trip from Victoria. The only outfit offering such tours in February was entitled the Prince of Whales, which we all found mildly amusing.

The information promised a host of year round wildlife. Recent Trip Advisor reviews had mentioned orcas, sea lions and a bald eagle feeding frenzy. And best of all there was a year round whale guarantee, a free trip if whales were not seen. Lasting a lifetime.

We booked the only possible vessel, a 12 man Zodiac and scanned the ensuing waiver forms briefly before signing up.

The day dawned and we breakfasted well. I enjoyed a really rather lovely granola and yoghurt pot with berry compote, and we arrived in good time.

We donned immensley unflattering ‘survival suits’ (which should have been more of a clue than I gave them credit for), and at the last minute, having decided to leave all but my binoculars in the storage lockers, stuffed 3 air sickness bags, pilfered from long ago flights, into my pocket.

Middlest also went through a very bad travel sickness phase, and Eldest once played too many video games on a flight to Florida and vomited all over me about 4 hours in. These bags dated from those days, c 13 years ago, and I had discovered them in a secret pocket of my hiking rucksack, which was my day bag when my kids needed snacks, and wipes and inhalers, whilst I was searching for lip balm. I thought discretion was the better part of valour, and despite my new found water confidence, decided to take them along.

Before we even left the harbour we had seen 2 seals and a bald eagle. The going was smooth. Things were good.

We left the confines of the harbour and things got a little choppier. We were bouncing in the manner of a fairground ride over waves, dropping between each one. It was quite fun. Everyone was shrieking good naturedly.  I clung on with both hands to the rail in front and braced my feet on the seat and then we slowed to see a colony of 2 sorts of sea lions. This was fun, if smelly, they were barking away, some on rocks and some in the water. 

Shortly after we saw harbour seals, and later a school of porpoises. Things then got a little serious as a merchant vessel had spotted orca and we raced off to try to find them. 

Much bumping and shrieking later we spotted spouts and fins and sure enough we had orca. We slowed down and bobbed around on the waves, using binoculars and generally being giddy. People asked if they could stand up. It was indeed an amazing sight. These were resident orca, salmon eating and highly endangered. We could not get too close but that was fine, we had binoculars and they were putting on a show.

Sadly the bobbing did not really agree with me and the familiar feeling of sickness began to rise. I removed a bag, remembered its age, and put it inside another, before vomiting (in a way I hoped was relatively discreetly) into said bag. It was at this point that I began to really regret the berry compote. Vomiting purple makes everything less discrete. 

Feeling slightly better we then set off again at an alarming rate bouncing uncomfortably over the waves in a search grid for transient orca and humpbacks. I was now clinging on for dear life with only one hand whilst holding a bag of sick closed with the other.

Everytime we stopped to look at something (and we did see a few more orca and sea lion) I would vomit again into the bag. Worrying about capacity after the 2nd tine, I got my third and final bag out of my pocket (which neccessitated Youngest briefly holding the first bag of sick) and hoped the ordeal would not go on too much longer. As my bags had run out. Sadly a time check revealed we had 2 hours to go…

Luckily by the last time we stopped I was dry heaving and so adequate bag capacity was achieved.

Then we needed to head back. At some point my friend’s phone’s roaming had welcomed her to the States, and so we were clearly a long way from home.

The waves had got bigger and the wind was now in our faces. The drops got bigger and more jarring. And on one particular, very large drop, I jarred my back badly and my friend banged her finger so hard thar a few days later we ended up at the smallest hospital we have ever seen, ruling out a break.

I was now in a lot of pain, cold, clinging on with one hand, juggling 2 bags of sick in the other and Youngest needed a wee. The hour back to the harbour was amongst the longest of my life. No one was shrieking, in fact silent grimness had descended.

We finally moored, got out of the boat and I hobbled to the near by bin to deposit my sick. Again I hoped discreetly. We went inside, got out of our survival suits and went back to our hotel, to, in my case, lie flat on my back, take ibuprofen on repeat and try to recover.

To add insult to injury, despite seeing orca, we are apparently still entitled to a free trip as ‘resident’ orca do not count. Quite why I am not sure. They were good enough for me.

And there is categorically no way I will ever step foot on such a boat again.

At some point I will probably look back in hindsight at the trip and remember that I did see whales in the wild and feel some fondness. It will take several visits to my osteopath before that is even remotely likely.