The National Geographic Traveler editors have presented the new year's 20 must-see places and the Central Coast is among them, being referred to as ‘Canada’s fragile coastal wilderness.’
Travel editor Robert Earle Howells describes the Great Bear Rainforest as ‘the planet’s largest intact coastal temperate rain forest, is an untamed strip of land stretching 250 miles along British Columbia’s coast that harbors extensive tracts of giant hemlock, Sitka spruce, and red cedar. The mighty trees rise high above a moist and ferny forest floor patrolled by coastal wolves, minks, Canada’s largest grizzly bears, and rare white Kermode spirit bears.’
Howell goes on to introduce the threat of Enbridge, saying,‘this tranquillity has recently been rocked by a proposal to send tar sands crude oil from Alberta to a terminal at Kitimat in the Great Bear Rainforest. The project would entail two pipelines crossing some of the world’s largest salmon-producing watersheds and a steady procession of supertankers plying the narrow channels. The local First Nations and environmental groups are vehemently opposed, fearing the catastrophic effects of an Exxon Valdez–type spill.’
More information and the complete list of National Geographics Best Trips for 2013 can be found online at www.nationalgeographic.com
