Telegraph Cove

Telegraph Cove

From Tofino, we drove back to the east coast, and on up towards the north, to a little place called Telegraph Cove. It took us slightly longer than expected, because after stopping for lunch in Courtenay, we came back off the main road to get fuel, and instead of it being just off the road as we thought it would be, it was quite a bit further.

Telegraph Cove

Then, having no real idea where we were, we managed to go in the wrong direction, so had to retrace our steps and ended up on the coastal road instead of the main highway. As mistakes go though, it wasn’t a bad one to make, as the views along the way were lovely.

We stayed in the dark red building, Telegraph Cove

We were soon back joined up with the main road at Campbell River, and we eventually made it to Telegraph Cove. The little information sheet that we picked up at the accommodation reception, which also doubled as a café and a visitors’ centre, describes the place as ‘a quaint boardwalk community’, and that is probably about right. If you take away the campsite, RV parking area, and the related café and souvenir shop, and all you have left are the early 1900s timber houses that line the boardwalk, and it does all look very pretty.

Telegraph Cove

The community started when a telegraph station was put here on 1911, and grew a little around nine years later, when Albert Wastell, the land owner, started up a Japanese salmon saltery. This led to building a sawmill to cut logs and build boxes to put the salmon in. However the endeavour was a little short-lived, and by the 1930s, the saltery was closed, and the sawmill had to scrape by through the sale of lumber.

A pod of orcas in the bay, Telegraph Cove

With the advent of WWII, business picked up, and the settlement took off – to the extent that somewhere this size can be regarded as having ‘taken off’. The workers at the sawmill brought their families, and a proper community was created, including a school and a post office. The sixty-strong community got its electricity from the sawmill’s steam generator, but only until the steam engineer controlling it went to bed. It amused us to read that he would dim the lights five minutes before he was going to retire for the night, to give everyone a chance to fire up their oil lamps before the lights went out.

A pod of orcas in the bay, Telegraph Cove

Nowadays, the old buildings have been largely turned into tourist accommodation, a café and a restaurant, and the business here is mostly fishing and wildlife tours, but the conversion has been done tastefully, without destroying the character of the place. They also have a small Whale Interpretive Centre here, which doesn’t have a lot, but what it has is quite interesting, and worth spending half an hour taking a look at.

A pod of orcas in the bay, Telegraph Cove

It is a pity that the café, which has prime position at the water’s edge, closes early, but as the weather was nice on the evening we arrived, we could enjoy sitting at the end of the boardwalk, and being able to see a pod of orcas out in the bay, giving us a taste of what was to come over the next couple of days.