East Sooke Coast Trail

How long is the East Sooke Coast Trail?  It seems to depend on what you read, which app you use, which trails you actually take, and so on, and so on. Anywhere between 10 - 17 km but, according to all our devices, for us it was about 14 km of lots of up and down, in and out from the coast, casual hiking to hands on scrambling. But always beautiful! Taking our time and enjoying the views along the way, it took us about 7 hours to complete. 

Andrew and I met Rebecca, Ian and John at Aylard Farms at the east end of Sooke Regional Park. We then carpooled to Pike Road trailhead at the west end of the trail where we started. 

Map courtesy of Capital Regional District

We found slugs, spiders, birds and many plants; what we think was a seal popping it's head out of the water a few times; we kept a close watch for whales but all we saw were the whale watching boats along with various other water craft from canoes to barges, a cruise ship and a sail boat. 

The weather was perfect! Sun and cloud, a few minor spits of rain which thankfully wasn't enough to make the rocks slippery. This would not be a fun trail with slippery rocks! 

All in all, a fabulous day with good friends!