Rain, Rain, go away!

It was an early rise this morning, but good to practice packing up all our stuff. It takes a few times packing and unpacking to develop a system for your bag.
Everything has been working our perfectly so far. We arrived with plenty of time to purchase our tickets for the ferry 'Frances Barkley' and settle in for a 4 hour ride to Bamfield. This ferry is actually a cargo ferry, but they allow travellers on board to go down the inlet. We were surprised to see so many other people on the ferry (maybe around 25), but no hikers so far...where are they?
We had breakfast on the ferry - bacon, egg and cheese on an english muffin and coffee, probably our last 'hot' or 'fresh' meal for a while.
Travelling down the inlet was very beautiful. There was a slight fog that covered the tops of the trees.We passed many fishing campgrounds that people stay at all summer, as well as cottages and floating homes located throughout the inlet and sound.
There is also lots of logging out here. We saw ships loading massive logs and guys standing on them in the water as they were being lifted.

We are following a guide book called Blisters & Bliss to complete the rest of our trip. We were able to plan out a lot of the hike yesterday on the plane using this book.
Just passed a humpback whale!
...
After a well needed nap, we woke up to rain. It hasn't rained here in a couple of months (hence the forest fires). It's a steady rain and looks like it's here to stay. We arrived in Bamfield at 12 noon. We watched the ferry unload all the cargo in Bamfield before making one last stop to drop us off at the west docks.
A lady named Suzanne met us to take us to town to get fuel for our stove and drive us 5km to the Registration area.
We made it to the trailhead at Pachena Bay, and found the other hikers! We signed in to receive our permits, and attended the orientation session where we received our trail map and tide tables. Parks Canada has limited the number of hikers that start the trail each day. Only 30 people may start the trail from each end.
After talking with some of the other hikers, we were so glad we took the ferry here and not the bus. Apparently the ride is extremely rough through the logging country. 
We ended up staying at the registration centre the rest of the day to stay dry, the rain was still very constant and heavy (30mm of rain forecasted). Eventually, we had to go set up our tent at Pachena Bay Campground in the rain. This was not an ideal way to start off the trek but we are staying positive and making good use of the pack covers that Willy's mom made us.
We met a group of 4 people just finishing the trail around 5:30pm. They were drenched and exhausted, but managed to give us some good tips:
- take longer than 4 days to complete the trail
- put gaiters on day 1
- burgers and crabshack are a must
- poles take a while to get used to 
- beaches (trail) not always the easiest
- the packs do not get lighter
I'm hoping that last one is just because they are water logged.
Tonight we had beef chili and rice for dinner courtesy of Willy's boss Lisa. It warmed us up. It's 9:30pm and it's still raining steadily, and there are giant slugs all over our tent!
Time to sleep, we start the trail in the morning!