Neverland Found Remote Clayoquot Wilderness Resort Charming, Cozy

Children know the best Neverlands blend awesome settings, exotic creatures and colorful characters. They also know that getting there usually requires special conveyance (fairy dust helps), plus good directions: “Second to the right, and straight on till morning.”

The same can be said of the best vacation destinations.

Clayoquot Wilderness Resort on Vancouver Island’s rugged west coast is such a place. The 16-room resort floats in tranquil Quait Bay, where black bears comb beaches and loons dive for herring.

Just beyond the bay is spectacularly wooded Meares Island, centerpiece of the proposed Clayoquot Sound biosphere reserve. Each spring and fall, 19,000 gray whales migrate through local waters.

A 90-minute boat ride up the coast is Hot Springs Cove, a Zen-like garden of natural pools fed by steamy water gushing from a dense, temperate rain forest. The pools are reached via a 1.2-mile elevated boardwalk that looks like it materialized straight out of the imaginary world of Myst.

The resort’s colorful characters include a chef named Tim who performs culinary magic each night while swapping yarns with guests seated at the open-kitchen counter … John and Adele, the resort managers whose private menagerie includes horses, dogs and a red-tailed hawk named Hannah … and Gordon, the gregarious, ponytailed, Aussie-accented jack-of-all-trades who lives on a sailboat with two cats and his wife, Erin, the restaurant hostess and former stage assistant to tiger-tamers Siegfried & Roy.

In the tradition of classic Neverlands, Clayoquot Wilderness Resort is off the beaten track. You can drive as far as Tofino, a fishing and tourist village three hours west of Nanaimo, then board the resort’s water taxi for a 30-minute ride. Or you can fly to Vancouver, B.C., and catch a one-hour flight to Tofino.

But the most memorable - and convenient - way to arrive is by sea plane. Sound Flight meets you at SeaTac, buses you to nearby Renton Airport and then shuttles you across Puget Sound at 6,500 feet, touching down at the resort’s doorstep.

Clayoquot (pronounced CLACK-watt) is a 127-acre work in progress. Two years ago, it was an abandoned lumbermill site strewn with old boilers, trash and felled trees. Two years hence, it will boast a 20-room hilltop lodge reached by tram, plus several cabins overlooking the property’s two lakes.

In the meantime, Clayoquot is a charming, quiet outpost where guests can choose from an invigorating list of diversions: fresh- and salt-water fishing, kayaking, whale-watching, horseback riding, beachcombing, hiking, or cooling off in a waterfall-fed swimming hole.

Or they can just hang out at the resort, a former gravel-barge-turned-fishing-lodge anchored in Quait Bay.

The lodge’s main entertainment area - a Vancouver pub in a previous life - features a cozy reading area with overstuffed chairs and a fireplace, a bar, dining-room seating and the open kitchen. A wrap-around deck provides access to exercise equipment, a hot tub and inspiring natural views.

The private rooms each are cozy, furnished with comforters, original Indian artwork, thick terry robes and top-of-the-line toiletries. And they’re quiet, since the resort’s only television is relegated to a separate area. Each room has access to a balcony. (The best views are from the east-facing, second-floor rooms.)

Remoteness in the resort business can be a mixed blessing, observes co-owner Randy Goddard, a former car-dealership owner. Guests like feeling they’ve left civilization behind, but they aren’t eager to sacrifice creature comforts. Luckily for Clayoquot’s owners, they were able to tap into one of their two lakes and generate three times more hydro-electric power than they currently need.

Another bonus: Much of the wood necessary for expansion can be milled on site from old-growth cedar lying around the property, a casualty of the original mill operation that went bust in the 1930s.

Goodard and his partner- a well-off former fishing buddy with a Monaco mailing address - bought the property for a song in 1996, mainly because it was in such dreadful shape. But already their vision of Paradise is emerging from the scarred landscape. The secret of their success, confides 47-year-old Goddard, “is hiring a bunch of 25-year-old guys who are tough as nails and who love the woods.”

Rates at Clayoquot are reasonable - about $125 to $165 (U.S.) a person per day, including all meals and non-alcoholic drinks. Dinners typically are elegant-yet-informal four-course affairs featuring fresh seafood, local produce, bread right out of the oven, and irresistible dessert. “Healthy Northwest cuisine” is how Chef Tim describes them.

“We’re building something that offers absolutely everything,” says Goddard. “When we have that, we’ll be able to charge more. But, for now, we’re just trying to encourage people to discover us.”

Or you can fly to SeaTac and take a Sound Flight sea plane from Renton to the resort. Total cost: About $400 per person, round trip from Spokane. Total travel time: 3 hours each way.

Clayoquot Wilderness Resort operates 16 rooms and a restaurant year round. Rates (including meals) vary depending on season, ranging from the current low of $125 (U.S.) a day per person, double occupancy, to $165 in summer. For more information, call the resort toll-free at (888) 333-5405, or visit its Web site at www.wildretreat.com.

The Pacific Rim Whale Festival runs March 13-28. For more information, contact the Tofino-Long Beach Chamber of Commerce at (250) 725-3414, or on the Web at www.island.net/ tofino.

IF YOU GO: Clayoquot, B.C. By car from Eastern Washington, take Interstate 90 west to Seattle, then Interstate 5 north to the Canadian border. Take BC Ferries from Tsawwassen to Nanaimo (two hours; about $25 U.S. for vehicle and two passengers, each way). Follow the New Island Highway northwest to Port Alberni, and continue west on Highway 4 to Tofino. The resort’s water taxi will take you to Quait Bay. Total travel time: 12 hours. You can fly to Vancouver, B.C., and take North Vancouver Air ((800) 228-6608) to Tofino, and catch the water taxi. Total cost: About $440 per person, round trip from Spokane. Total travel time: 3 hours each way.