Filled with excited anticipation of a hot shower, clean laundry and a solid meal, Krysta Norwick trudged into Tofino under a deluge of rain. The appeal of the usually mundane elevated after hiking hundreds of kilometres – the length of Vancouver Island – eventually gave way to awe of what she and her husband Brian had accomplished. “It is really cool that we walked here from Victoria,” Norwick remembers thinking later.
One cool May morning after breakfast at home, the backpack-wearing couple locked the door of their downtown apartment and headed out on their second long distance hike of the month. The couple previously warmed up with the Sunshine Coast Trail. With several long distance hikes under her belt, starting from home was a first for Norwick.
“The first step we took of the hike was the first step out of our apartment, it was so cool,” she said. “That was so thrilling because the other hikes I’ve done I had to travel quite a distance to get to the start of the trail.” Norwick is an avid through hiker – which means tackling an established long distance trail end-to-end in one take.
Her first was the Great Divide Trail just a few years ago. Since then she’s added the Croatian Long Distance Trail and Pacific Crest Trail before this spring’s adventure checked the West Coast and Juan de Fuca trails off her list. “I just fell in love with long distance hiking and I have ben trying to do at least one long hike every year since,” she said.
“I real.