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Travel General

The Great Canadian Bucket List

One-of-a-Kind Travel Experiences

by (author) Robin Esrock

Publisher
Dundurn Press
Initial publish date
Jun 2017
Category
General, Adventure, Outdoor Skills
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781459739383
    Publish Date
    Jun 2017
    List Price
    $24.99
  • eBook

    ISBN
    9781459739406
    Publish Date
    Jun 2017
    List Price
    $11.99
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9781771023016
    Publish Date
    Oct 2013
    List Price
    $19.99

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Description

A National Bestseller!
Fully revised with new chapters and fascinating destinations to explore, renowned travel writer Robin Esrock guides you to Canada’s most incredible experiences.

Having visited more than 100 countries on 7 continents, Robin Esrock has built a career chasing the extraordinary. His bestselling Bucket List books feature experiences that are entirely unique, instantly memorable, wholly inspirational, and available to all. Celebrating his adopted home of Canada, Robin journeys to every province and territory to reveal the remarkable activities and destinations that are unique to the True North strong and free. Get ready to:

  • Cross the mythical Northwest Passage
  • Cycle across Prince Edward Island
  • Float on Canada’s very own Dead Sea
  • Feel the hot breath of a wild polar bear
  • Cave bash along Quebec’s Magdalen Islands
  • Sail among whales in the “Galapagos of the North”
  • Taste Canada’s best poutine, smoked meat, and fish and chips
  • Raft a tidal wave, roll your car uphill, camp in the Arctic
  • and much more!

Robin packs each chapter with colourful descriptions, unforgettable characters, quirky trivia, and eye-popping photography. With more than 70 exciting new experiences, the new edition unlocks an extensive online companion where you’ll find videos, galleries, maps, reading guides, and all the practical information you’ll need to follow in Robin’s footsteps.

About the author

Robin Esrock is an internationally recognized travel personality on TV, on stage, online, and in print. A former columnist for the Globe and Mail, MSN, Outpost, and Vancouver Sun, Robin's stories and photograph have also appeared in dozens of major publications including the Chicago Tribune, Guardian, Sydney Morning Herald, Toronto Star, South China Morning Post, and National Geographic Traveler. Robin is the creator and co-host of Word Travels, a 40-part TV series syndicated on National Geographic and Travel Channel International worldwide in over 20 languages. He is the author of the smash bestselling book series, The Great Canadian Bucket List, as well as international bestsellers The Great Global Bucket List, The Great Australian Bucket List, and 75 Places to Take the Kids (before they don't want to go).

Having visited over 115 countries on 7 continents, Robin has delivered dozens of inspiring keynotes for companies and organizations events around the world. his TEDx talk about what travel can teach us has over one million views. Robin has been featured as a bucket list travel expert by 60 Minutes, Wall Street Journal, CBC, CTV, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, Men's Health, Travel + Leisure, Yahoo, and many others. A Fellow of the Royal Canadian Geographic Society, Robin is a columnist for Canadian Geographic as well as a Canadian Geographic Travel Ambassador. He is also a member of the Society of American Travel Writers, and the Travel Media Association of Canada.

Born and raised in South Africa, Robin lives in Vancouver with his wife and two young children. Through blogs and social media channels, he continues to inspire his audience with his acclaimed storytelling, quirky wit, unique curiosity, and eye for the unforgettable.

Robin Esrock's profile page

Excerpt: The Great Canadian Bucket List: One-of-a-Kind Travel Experiences (by (author) Robin Esrock)

Haida Gwai

West of British Columbia’s west coast, beyond the boiling water of stormy dreams and on the knife’s edge of the continental shelf, is a 280-kilometre-long archipelago of unsurpassed myth and beauty. A region of mountains, creeks, and towering trees, these Pacific islands are inhabited by a culture whose uniqueness means its art is instantly recognized, and the language of its people found nowhere else on Earth. When I set off to discover the best of Canada, I asked fellow travel writers what tops their own national bucket lists. More often than not, the answer was Haida Gwaii.
Flying into the sleepy village of Sandspit, I catch a ferry over to the $26-million Haida Cultural Centre to give the adventure some context. Here, I learn about the two Haida clans — Eagles and Ravens — and how they balance each other in marriage, trade, and even death. I learn about the importance of western red cedar, how imposing “totem” poles were carved to tell legends, honour people, and identify homesteads. I learn how this proud warrior nation, whose seafaring and ferocity have been compared to that of the Vikings, was all but exterminated after a century of European contact in a deadly cocktail of disease and cultural genocide. Of the Haida who thrived on these islands, 95 percent disappeared, but their descendants are staging a remarkable comeback. First they reclaimed their art, which is recognized worldwide as a pinnacle of First Nations cultural expression. Next they reclaimed ownership of their land in an unprecedented deal with the federal government, so that the Queen Charlotte Islands became Haida Gwaii (Place of the People). Now they are relearning their language, before it, too, becomes a ghost echoing in the forest. It gives me a lot to think about as the Moresby Explorers’ 400-horsepower Zodiac speeds down the coast into the vast protected realms of Gwaii Haanas Marine Conservation Area Reserve and Haida Heritage Site. I am late for a date with Bluewater Adventures’ 21-metre-long Island Roamer, on which I will join a dozen tourists from around the country on a week-long sailing expedition. This 1,500-square-kilometre national park reserve, unique in its stewardship from mountaintop to ocean floor, can only be accessed via boat and float plane. Only 2,000 visitors are allowed each season. Founded in 1988, the reserve was a hard-fought victory for the Haida over political roadblocks and multinational logging companies busy shearing the islands of their forests. I hop on board to find new friends, deeply fascinated with the culture, wildlife, and beauty, and relishing the comfortable yacht in which to explore it. The islands of Gwaii Haanas boast 40 endemic species of animals and plants, are a haven for 23 types of whale and dozens of seabirds, and are covered with dense old-growth temperate rainforest. Sailing the calm waters between the coves and bays of the park’s 138 islands, we spot humpbacks, seals, sea lions, and a large family of rare offshore orcas. Bluewater’s Zodiac and kayaks deposit us onshore to explore forests of giant western red cedar, hemlock, and Sitka spruce, the ground carpeted with bright green moss and fern. We walk among the ruins of an old whaling station in Rose Harbour and pick up Japanese garbage on Kunghit Island, blown in with the raging storms of the Pacific. In Echo Harbour, we watch schools of salmon launch themselves from the sea into the creek and a huge black bear (Haida Gwaii boasts the biggest black bears found anywhere) lick its lips in anticipation. We do the same on the yacht, with chef Deborah serving up fresh coconut-crusted halibut and other delights from her small but fully equipped galley.
As an eco-adventure, Gwaii Haanas deserves its reputation as a “Canadian Galapagos.” Yet it’s the legacy of the Haida themselves that elevates this wild, rugged coastline, a history best illustrated by the remarkable UNESCO World Heritage Site on Anthony Island, now known as SGang Gwaay. Haida lived here for millennia, but after the plague of smallpox, European trade, and residential schools, all that remains, fittingly, are eerie, carved cedar mortuary poles. Facing the sea like sentinels with the thick forest at their backs, they make it an unforgettable and haunting place to visit, and all the more so for the effort it takes to do so. The five Haida village National Historic Sites in Gwaii Haanas — Skedans, Tanu, Windy Bay, Hotspring Island, and SGang Gwaay — are guarded by the Watchmen, local men and women employed by the community and Parks Canada. James Williams has been a Watchman at SGang Gwaay for over a decade, showing visitors around and enthusiastically describing the history of the village and the legacy of the poles. He tells us how the Haida attached supernatural qualities to the animals and trees that surrounded them; hence their culture borne out of tales featuring bears, ravens, eagles, killer whales, otters, and cedar. Unassuming in his baseball cap, James discusses violent battles with mainland tribes, the Haida acumen for trade, canoe building, and their interaction with European sea-otter traders, which ultimately killed off the animal and very nearly finished off the Haida themselves. Today, these weathered ash-grey mortuary poles are maintained to honour a tradition that once thrived and shows signs of thriving again. Tombstones that seem older than their 150-year-old origins, they remind me of the stone heads on Easter Island, the stone carvings of Angkor. Trees rattle in the onshore breeze as the forest slowly reclaims the remains of abandoned cedar longhouses. Isolated for months, James gifts us with some freshly caught halibut as he welcomes some arriving kayakers. With Watchmen having to live in solitude for months at a time, it is not so much a job as a calling.
Each abandoned village is different, and each Watchman reveals more about this rugged West Coast wonderland and the people who call it home. By the end of the week, both the land and its stewards have woven a spell over us. Designed to last the length of a single lifetime, old Haida totem poles will not last forever. Fortunately, the protection of Gwaii Haanas, by both the Haida people and Parks Canada, along with the deep respect paid to both by operators like Randy Burke’s Bluewater Adventures, ensures this magical archipelago will remain on the Canadian bucket list for generations to come.

Editorial Reviews

The Great Canadian Bucket List is what the giant sequoia is to trees … a big game changer. This weighty tome will be a definitive guide to any Canuck looking to experience great travel and adventure within the confines of our enormous country — the greatest place on earth!

Jon Montgomery, host of The Amazing Race Canada

One of Canada’s top travel writers, and definitely one of our biggest personalities.

Globe and Mail

As the saying goes, the longest journey begins with a single step. Esrock’s book just might inspire you to take it.

The Georgia Straight

User Reviews

The Great Canadian Bucket List

Robin travelled every province and territory, gleaning experiences that you'd never have known existed in this country. From culture, food, adventures for the adrenaline junkies, hidden gems and well-known destinations; Robin Esrock has compiled a travel guide unlike any other and the whole bucket list travel idea seems to be catching on. Just check with your local book store and you'll find bucket list adventure ideas abound. Few, if any though, include the humour and the personal touch that Robin infuses this must-have guide with.