In 2024, Tofino received more than 711,000 visitors, generating $430 million for the local economy and providing more than 3000 direct jobs. With a long weekend at my disposal, I pass up on the scenic road trip to spend more time on the ground. While Tofino today is associated with a tranquil beauty, I want to learn more about its turbulent past. Elder and elected Tla-o-qui-aht First Nations Chief Moses Martin would be the perfect guide. 

Tofino is located within Clayoquot Sound, a region of old-growth temperate rainforest that encompasses about 350,000 hectares of forests, fjords, and islands — making it one of the largest remaining areas of temperate rainforest anywhere in the world. In April 1993, the B.C. government announced a controversial land-use decision to allow 62 per cent of Clayoquot Sound to be logged, with plans to protect the remaining 38 per cent. Environmentalists protested, and the decision sparked massive public outrage. It triggered what was at the time the largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian history, with more than 12,000 people visiting a protest camp established to block logging trucks from entering the forest.

Local residents, Indigenous activists, students, and scientists gathered at this Peace Camp, international media tuned in, and Hollywood celebrities, including Robert Redford and Oliver Stone, spoke out against the clear-cutting. Australia’s Midnight Oil performed a makeshift concert to a crowd of thousands. This battle of ideology, wills, and ultimately lawyers became known as the War in the Woods.

I remember enough of the 70’s to feel oddly at home with the working rotary phones, pop art and retro wall clocks, and half expect Austin Powers to emerge from the bird sanctuary out back. Inside my room, leather armchairs, unusual lamps, and funky bathroom tiles feel less like a hotel and more like the home of someone with good taste and an unusual affection for the 1970s. Joining sister properties in Victoria and Kelowna, Hotel Zed adds to Tofino’s eclectic character.

“For years, the only meals I knew in Tofino were campfire stews,” I tell my wife as she tucks into fresh albacore tuna tartare accompanied by delectable Brussels sprouts with breadcrumbs and grana padano. There’s a line-up outside Shelter, which relocated to the waterfront after a fire destroyed its original townsite location in 2022. We devour sous-vide chargrilled flat-iron steak with truffle-parmesan fries, excellent local craft beer, and a heavenly chocolate pot de crème with salted caramel. Shelter, Ombre, Shed and Wolf in the Fog are some of the acclaimed local restaurants that have redrawn the boundaries of Tofino’s culinary map.

I had earned a feast, having taken a paddle-boarding lesson with Swell Tofino, located steps away from Chesterman Beach. “The surf schools are the busiest I’ve seen them in years,” explains Swell’s owner, Emre Bosut. Gazing up from my SUP board, I notice bald eagles effortlessly circling overhead. You won’t find that scene in Hawaii.