Vancouver Island Nature Tours

Rainbird’s Mushroom excursions are a growing success! So much so that we put on an extra tour. The tour included an afternoon of picking mushrooms, primarily Chanterelles, followed by a gourmet dinner featuring the mushrooms we had just picked at Batstar Cafe & Picnic.

Although this year has been a poor year for mushrooms there were plenty of Chanterelles for everyone on the tour. The wonderful dry summer weather has extended well into the fall this year. This means that the mushroom crop is unusually late. Still the groups found a variety of interesting mushrooms including Fly Agric (deadly poisonous), Angel Wings (good eating), Admirable Bolete (choice eating), Funnel Clitocybe, White Worm Coral, and Straight-branched Coral. There were many others we couldn’t name.

All the guests were sworn to secrecy about the location to ensure success next year. The location is generally fairly level. But there are some banks, rolling hills, and a stream that require a little agility to get up, down and over. This is bush-whacking. So there will be logs and bushes in your face a little. However, compared to most places on Vancouver Island the terrain is easy!

Before the guests arrived they were advised that they should be wearing hiking boots or some other sturdy footwear that could get wet. The bush is generally very damp at this time of year. They were also told to bring wet-weather gear in case it rained. To me, wet weather gear means rain-pants as well as rain coat. No umbrellas! You will find that it would get caught on everything. And you need your hands free to pick the mushrooms.

Things got rolling about 12:30PM - just after lunch. It was a 25-minute drive out to the picking grounds. Before entering the bush, I told the guests that they were in the bottom of a valley, and that the road we were on followed the bottom of the valley. We would be picking below the road. So that if anyone got separated from the group they could hike uphill to the road. I asked everyone to stay within earshot of me. These instructions turned out to be unnecessary as everyone was pretty good about staying within earshot. We were finished picking by about 3:30 to 4:30 PM. We spent a little time cleaning the Chanterelles we had picked.

Everyone was back in town in time to change and get ready for dinner. And what a feast it was! Master Chef, Ron Storey, started cooking when he was 10 years old. At he rip old age of 30-something, he has accumulated 20 years of experience learning under one of the best chefs in Vancouver. The dinners for each tour were different, providing an element of the unexpected on each day. Before the third course, Ron came out from the kitchen to greet the guests and to explain personally what the dinners were and how they were prepared. After dinner, the restaurant owner, Blake Johnson, set up a screen and computer projector so that I, and anyone else could show digital pictures of the afternoon’s picking as well as pictures from some of the other excursions Rainbird offers.