In this tour, we will explore the cultural and ecological history of the beautiful District of Metchosin with ecologist Andy MacKinnon and archaeologist Darcy Mathews. Metchosin has expansive tracts of relatively undeveloped coastal prairie, Douglas-fir, and Garry oak ecosystems. Home to the Straits Salish people, this landscape has a rich history of human occupation. The tour will focus on the Rocky Point property, a Department of National Defence facility. This property contains some of the best remaining examples of old growth forests on southeastern Vancouver Island. It also presents a diverse and fascinating record of First Nations interaction with, and creation of, their social and physical landscape. This landscape, with its Mediterranean climate and savannah and Garry oak meadows, includes coastal shell midden village sites, a defensive trench embankment, Douglas-fir culturally modified trees, camas meadows, and earth ovens. The Garry oak woodlands were maintained for centuries or millennia by aboriginal burning, to enhance production of edible bulbs and berries, and deer. With cessation of burning more than a century ago, the structure and composition of these woodlands has changed, with important ecological consequences. Central to this cultural landscape are the burial cairn cemeteries, the largest of which has over 300 cairns. The cairns range from small piles of rocks, to elaborate and massive rock and soil structures.
Following our tour, we will join the E. Sooke Park field trippers and dine together at the world class Sooke Harbour House.   Many people remember lunch at Sooke Harbour House from the 1994 meeting as one of the highlights of that conference!

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Join us for a day of exploring the cultural landscape of the Cowichan people in beautiful the Cowichan Valley.  Learn about how Cowichan traditions and their landscape are inter-twined in the web of life.  You will be welcomed to Cowichan territory at Mt Prevost with a stunning view of the Cowichan Valley.  Learn about Cowichan past and present from the first Cowichan ancestors who fell from the sky to the arrival of Europeans to today.   You will tour several of the Cowichan cultural and ecological ventures, such as the salmon hatchery, the native plant nursery and the historically important, Stone Church.  We will also visit  Yey'um'nuts (Somenos Creek), the location of an ancient  burial ground and a Garry Oak meadow.  Cowichan cultural experts will be your guides, including some combination of Dianne Hinkley, the Lands Research Director, for the Cowichan Tribes; Elder Luschiim who holds a PhD and a treasure trove of traditional ecological and historical knowledge;  Kenny Elliott, a Cowichan native plant specialist; Tim Kulchyski, Cowichan tribal member learned in language, culture and environment; and Tsousilum, Cowichan, cultural and traditional knowledge keeper. All this, and you get to enjoy a locally catered lunch served in one of the Cowichan Big House dining halls. 

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Discover the rich and beautiful natural and cultural history of Victoria with Grant Keddie, the curator of archaeology at the Royal B.C. Museum. You will begin your tour by walking just fifteen minutes from the Marriott hotel to Beacon Hill, where you can enjoy the panoramic view of the Juan de Fuca Strait. From this vantage spot, Grant will provide an overview of the changing natural and human landscape of the region over the last 25,000 years. The walk will proceed past the fields of blooming blue camas -- a "root food" of extreme importance to Coast Salish peoples. From there you will continue your walk past examples of the First Nations burial cairns that used to cover this landscape. A downhill path through the camas leads to an aboriginal defensive site on the sea shore, where you will discuss both ancient history and Victoria's more recent cultural landscape.

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