shinrin yoku
My vision is to offer the forest bathing experience (shinrin yoku). Forest therapy has been a critical element in my health and well-being. Though I am not a licensed Forest therapist, I believe the forest itself does the therapy, and the only requirement is to be in the present moment. Take your shoes off and firmly plant your feet in the soil so you are grounded. Become one with the forest and let the energy of the source rejuvenate your soul. Feel the breeze, hear it whispering through the trees, and know that all there is now and you are on purpose. All devices must be turned off for this portion of the journey.
Your Tour Guide:
Strider Spence Ashmore
Vancouver Island became my home in Victoria General Hospital on May 11, 1979, when I was born early that morning as Strider Spence Ashmore. Coombs B.C. is where I grew up and first attended grade school at French Creek Elementary just across the bridge from the world-renowned old country market, aka the place with the Goats on the Roof. The home I grew up in was located on acreage at the end of an old dirt road out in the sticks. This is where I first learned to love and appreciate nature and all its beauty. I would spend countless hours catching frogs, snakes, salamanders and, if lucky, the occasional toad. My childhood dream was to grow up and be a toad farmer.
I graduated with honours from Kwalicum Secondary School in 1997. I spent the next eight years moving all over B.C. and Alberta as a carpenter or in the oil and gas industry. In 2005, I found myself in Courtenay, B.C., where I became the sole proprietor of Guns and Hoses Construction. I have successfully operated this business on a referral basis for almost 20 years. In 2023, after eighteen years of not loving the name of my business, I changed it to Ashmore Construction.
In the summer of 2020, on one of my many trips to Port Renfrew, I happened across a trail into an old-growth forest next to the Lonely Doug. The trail was only marked with a stick and a ribbon. Today, this forest is known as Edin Grove, which was named as such by the Ancient Forest Alliance because of its location at the base of Edinburgh Mountain. At the end of this trail, next to a giant old-growth cedar tree, the idea to create an eco-tourism-based business was born. It wasn’t long before I realized there were fall boundary ribbons around this forest containing some of the most monumental trees I had ever seen. Edin Grove is within TFL 46 and has been surveyed for logging, though there are no immediate plans to log it. I came out of the forest that day as an environmental activist.
Since then, I have spent countless hours researching, signing petitions, donating time, money and resources, attending rallies and protesting the logging of old-growth trees. When the Fairy Creek blockade happened, I was there almost every weekend until Teal Jones was granted the court injunction. This was the largest act of civil disobedience in Canadian history. While it did lead to some two-year logging deferrals in the Fairy Creek watershed and got some International attention everywhere else, it was still old-growth logging as usual. I have experienced the feeling of standing in a freshly cut old-growth forest, and it is soul-crushing. These forests take thousands of years to establish biodiversity, which cannot be recreated by replanting. They just become poorly managed tree plantations. Some people think that the trees are dead or dying anyways, but they don’t realize there is often more life within these dying trees than the living ones.
Board on an Adventure with Ashmore
I bought a 14-passenger van in 2020, just before the COVID-19 pandemic. My dream of becoming an adventure tour coordinator was alive and well until this happened. It seemed impossible to do tours while socially distancing myself and with all the travel restrictions, but I never gave up.
Since then, I have taken my advanced wilderness first aid training for the second time and have been on almost every backcountry road of Vancouver Island. The van has had some necessary modifications and is tour-ready, as am I.
Ready for adventure?
If your spirit craves the exhilarating embrace of nature in its purest form, Ashmore Adventures is your gateway. Let us be your compass in discovering the wonders hidden within the wild. Join us for an adventure that challenges the body and enriches the soul.