We like to think of being able to visit wild locations and just pull up at a beach to spend the night. The number of locations where we can do that is being drastically eroded.
One of the oldest tenets in the world is freedom of the seas. Wars have been fought throughout history to preserve it. Granted, most of those wars were in pursuit of colonialism, but the nobility of the premise remains: no particular person or power should hold sway over the ability to freely travel the world's oceans.
It sounds so quaint. Of course numerous restrictions exist, for safety reasons, for military reasons, and others that are all perfectly understandable — at least in the context that the world does need rules and restrictions. Fair enough.
What I'm worried about isn't instances where restrictions have been imposed. It is where access is gradually being eroded. I'll talk about this in the context of Canada, and particularly the Pacific coast of Canada, where I can provide specific instances.
A forgotten aspect of the principle of freedom of the seas is the ability to be able to transit the coast as safely as possible. This means safe havens should be preserved so that boats have access to the safest possible routes. This involves a variety of factors, some no longer taken into account.
For boats, the number one way that access to the coast is being eroded is by private mooring buoys in anchorages. Cottage owners want somewhere to place their boat, and so they apply for and are almost always granted the right to drop a weight and secure a mooring buoy, essentially privatizing that portion of the British Columbia coast for their personal use as a parking spot. Add a number of these to any small, sheltered cove and suddenly the location is no longer usable for transient vessels.
Mooring buoys have a particular propensity to foul anchorages because boats at anchor turn on their anchors. In a perfect situation, boats can anchor in relatively close proximity because as the wind shifts the boats will turn in unison. Add a mooring buoy, though, and they stay in place in a circle around the mooring buoy. This requires anchoring vessels to anchor farther from mooring buoys than from other boats at anchor. This is turn drastically reduces the number of vessels that can use the anchorage -- unless the cove or bay is entirely mooring buoys, which is increasingly the case. In that event, transient boaters have to look elsewhere.
Here's the crunch: about the only restriction for being granted a permit for a mooring buoy is this stipulation — it "may not interfere with or even be likely to interfere with the navigation of any vessel." This restriction is viewed rather open-ended, so unless you apply for a buoy in the middle of a channel, you will be approved. However, if the powers-that-be really want to end the proliferation of these buoys (as they should), the same provision could be viewed as close-ended -- that is, any future application could be viewed as interfering with navigation as it restricts access to safe havens. Therefore the same provision could be viewed as an impediment to transit, and mooring buoys could be approved only where anchoring is not possible.
But that is not the case.
For paddlecraft, I view the concept of freedom of the seas a bit more widely, but still within the concept of the need for safe havens. To be able to transit the coast, paddlers, rowers and small boat owners need to have access to land. It need not be much. It just needs to be accessible and available where it exists. If viewed as safe havens in the life-saving context, it should be a requirement by law that these locations not be commandeered for other purposes. And yet they are.
One of the greatest potential impediments to traveling the coast by paddlecraft in the coming decades will be aboriginal rights and title and the abiliity of First Nations to set access restrictions within traditional lands. While those rights and titles are justifiable, well-meaning First Nations could easily put conservation and preservation of cultural and historical sites above any objective for public access. The result could be vast stretches of the coast are no longer safe to travel by paddlecraft because access is prohibited.
This isn't theoretical. The Kwiakah First Nation, in consultations with the BC Marine Trails Network Association, made the determination that Loughborough Inlet was not suitable for recreational use and as a result the marine trail association removed all possible campsite locations from the inlet, and additionally, closed down one major recreation site in Cordero Channel. The latter is significant for impeding the ability for the marine trail association to fulfill its safety mandate, which is to have an interconnected network of safe havens within a reasonable travel distance of one another. Other examples can be cited even within provincial parks, such as Insect Island, a once-prime camping area in Broughton Archipelago Provincial Park now closed, and recently a prime site in the Burdwood Group (which may reopen in several years, but we will see).
Those instances may be understandable on the basis of recognizing and preserving heritage and cultural sites. It is hard to argue against that. The problem is cumulative, and if no thought is given to the concept of freedom of the seas, and if no replacement locations are created, then transiting the coast simply won't be possible in the future. This isn't just hypothetical, it is logical. Since transit by canoe was the travel means of indigenous peoples historically, it is likely every suitable location for kayakers today was used historically. This means every paddlecraft location on the coast likely has some degree of cultural or historic value.
The answer, you would think, is in having more public land created for recreational use to offset shrinking opportunities and to meet increasing demand. The trend, however, is the opposite. Whenever new public land is created, the last consideration seems to be camping, as that is viewed as a detrimental use, and most new parcels are chosen for their conservation values. Any role as a safe haven on a marine trail is not a consideration. A recent example is the purchase of West Ballenas Island as a provincial park. It is the most advantageous possible safe haven for a transit across the Strait of Georgia by paddle from Vancouver island to the BC mainland. And yet there is no consideration at all for camping in plans for that property.
My personal favorite case to cite is the management plan for Wakes Cove Provincial Park, which stipulates no camping but says numerous locations nearby are available. My question is where are those within a reasonable distance for purposes of a marine trail system through the Gulf Islands? There is none unless you camp in unregulated Crown land parcels, which will ultimately be candidates best suited for conservation over camping. Such was the case for all the small islets in the southern Gulf Islands snapped up for the creation of the Gulf Islands National Park Reserve. They were the last remaining bits of Crown land in the southern Gulf Islands where someone could pull up a kayak. The national park made them all off-limits to camping.
In total it is a long list of locations purchased for public use where camping has not been on the agenda or casual unregulated camping as been eliminated. Fair enough. I can see from the standpoint of conservation that not all locations should become a camping free-for-all, which is too often the case, especially in unregulated locations. But if not the new parcels of land being created, then where? Where is the plan?
There isn't one. There is just a slow, steady erosion of public access over time.