Local Experienced Paddler Wanted, Lower Mainland BC or Southern Island

Looking for someone with ocean paddling experience and good judgement to paddle with for a time or two acting as a local guide of sorts.

I’m an experienced paddler on the Great Lakes in many conditions and all seasons but minimal ocean experience.

I’m on the mainland now but planning to be on the island in the next couple days. My plans are very flexible.

If you are open to hiring someone, I’d check with Ocean River Sports in Victoria. https://oceanriver.com/ Gordon Brown is (was? - haven’t kept track) working there, and is one of the top coaches in the world. You could possibly do a class/tour instead of just a paddle.

Justine Curvengen is in Ucluelet. She does tours also. https://www.cackletv.com/

For finding local contacts for people to paddle with (non-hire), you may want to check out West Coast Paddler site. As much as I hate to send people off of paddling.com to another site, I think you may find more local contacts there: https://www.westcoastpaddler.com/

Thanks for the leads, Peter. I was hoping to keep it free and informal, but was considering some of the things you’ve suggested if that doesn’t work out.

SKABC are a good group. I’d go wid ya, but I’m in a canoe and paddling rhythms are too different.