Meares Island
Meares Iceland is a 84.8 km ² large island off the west coast of Vancouver Iceland on the Canadian Pacific coast. In the north, less than 500 meters wide Matlset Narrows separate the island from Vancouver Iceland, and in the east of the 1.2 -km-wide Fortune Channel.
The Tla -o- qui -aht and Ahousaht the, the local First Nations, call the island Wah -nah- juss or Hilth - hoo - iss. The western part of the island is dominated by the 730 meter high Lone Cone. The Ahousat name of the mountain, Hilth - hoo - iss means translates as " The people who go to the mountains ." The east of the island is dominated by the 792 meter high Mount Colnett. The island is located about one kilometer north of Tofino and is from there by water taxi, which crosses the Browning Passage to reach in about ten minutes.
Meares Iceland is today the main part of the reserve is, in the Tla -o- qui live -aht, a tribe of the Nuu- chah- nulth. They also inhabit the south-east Iceland Indian location and an area at Heynen Channel in Clayoquot Sound.
In the south and west of the island are the villages Opitsat and Kakawis. The Tla -o- qui -aht - Opitsat settlement has 174 inhabitants (as of the 2006 census ) ..
History
On 12 June 1788 English navigator John Meares discovered the island. 1791/92 wintered the American Robert Gray on the island and left Fort Defiance build in Adventure Cove in Lemmens Inlet.
1811 150 Tla -o- qui -aht - warriors came the capers of the ship Tonquin killed. This loss destroyed the supremacy of the tribe in the southwest of Iceland Vancouver. In the 1880s, the further decimated by epidemics root reserves have been assigned on and near Meares Iceland. The island was Captain George Henry Richards of the Royal Navy, commander of HMS Hecate, named in 1862 after its discoverer.
In 1899, the Christian Indian Residential School on Meares Iceland. From 1920 onwards, the system of residential schools has been introduced. All children of the Tla -o- qui -aht between 7 and 15 years had now attending these schools. This system should initially be one of the main lever of integration policy, but led the violent conditions at these schools until 1983, when the last of these schools were closed ( Tofino ), a wave of lawsuits.
1984 declared the Tla -o- qui -aht the island a Tribal Park, sued successfully in court and received as "their" rainforest. With the establishment of the Pacific Rim National Park in 2001 large parts of the West Coast were placed under protection, either as part of the park or as a provincial park. Tourism in the region has now increased so much that Tofino had to make strict rationing water in late summer 2006. Therefore, the already planned 1985 Ahkmahksis Water reservoir, which was earlier than Ginnard Creek known to become much more urgent. However, 2007 was not yet finally approved.
Others
The Big Cedar Trail, a moderate, less than 3 km long trail is marked by yellow bands. However, it is at times muddy. Stairs and raised wooden paths still enable a relatively easy access.
Direction Tofino is located adjacent Morpheus Iceland. The island was 1900-1950 Tofinos cemetery and tied it to a centuries-old tradition of the Tla -o- qui -aht.