“What I hope tourism looks like is that the people that are supporting the community, the locals that are here, can stay here, and we can bring that respect into so many different spaces. We can bring ?iisaak (respect) into not just the educational space, but into the retail market, into all these spaces where it’s not extractive, it’s giving back to the community.” — Timmy Masso 

Tofino is at a crossroads. Known for its remote, rugged beauty and deep connection to the Pacific, this small town faces mounting challenges that may be familiar to where you live: housing affordability, economic inequality, environmental strain, and even seasonal water shortages. Yet as we learned in the first season of Travel Beyond in Tofino, the area is becoming a hub for collaboration, innovation, and a renewed commitment to ?iisaak – a Nuu-chah-nulth concept meaning respect. This season on Travel Beyond, we’ll explore how Tofino leaders and Nuu-chah-nulth culture-keepers are building ?iisaak to shape a better path for residents and visitors alike.

At the heart of this effort are brothers Timmy Masso and Hjalmer Wenstob. As artists and educators, they are using their deep connection to Nuu-chah-nulth language and art to encourage a more respectful relationship with the land and its people. “Language, in my opinion, is directly tied to our lands,” Timmy, a Nuu-chah-nulth language keeper, explains. “Learning just even a little bit of Nuu-chah-nulth can give you more of a connection to where you live.” 

Hjalmer, a carver and artist, sees art as a bridge, connecting visitors to the stories and histories that have defined the region for millennia. “Every year, we put two poles up in our territory—one goes to our communities, which are now reserves, and the other one goes up in a space that may be more public, but an important site for our people—so people understand when they come into our territory that they’re here, but they’re here as invited visitors,” he says. Through initiatives like place-based street signage, carving totem poles for significant sites, and creating children’s books in the Nuu-chah-nulth language, the brothers are showing visitors that respect is not just a one-to-one exchange, but a lifelong lesson embedded in relationships—with the land, its history, and the people who steward it.

Timmy and Hjalmer offer a clear path for tourism to leave a positive impact. By raising awareness and encouraging balance, they are inviting all who visit to see themselves not as outsiders but as partners in a respectful, thriving community.

You’ll also learn:

• How language is intertwined with land, culture, and identity.
• How Timmy and Hjalmer are building bridges across cultures through a local event called “Ask an Indian”.
• What goes into a vision for creating a balanced and respectful tourism economy.
• Ways to educate visitors about Indigenous history and traditions.

Subscribe to Travel Beyond through Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or your favourite podcast player.

Show notes

?iisaak Pledge —A commitment to practicing respect for the land, culture, and people of Tofino, inspired by the Nuu-chah-nulth teaching. 

Cedar House Gallery —A First Nations owned and operated art gallery located in Ucluelet, BC, specializing in Nuu-chah-nulth art.

Nuu-chah-nulth healing song — Created by Hjalmer Wenstob and Timmy Masso, this performance and song promoted healing in response to COVID-19.

Tourism Tofino — Tofino’s official not-for-profit destination marketing and management organization.

Episode transcript

This transcript was generated using AI and has been lightly reviewed for accuracy.

Hjalmer Wenstob: In the last few years, we both have been looking to take on more roles to educate visitors and public who are coming here.

Timmy Masso: In my opinion, learning just even a little bit of Nuu chah nulth can give you more of a connection to where you live. But I think it really comes back to ʔiisaak. It comes back to respect.

David Archer: Welcome to Travel Beyond. I’m David Archer from Destination Think, recording from Haida Gwaii, the territory of the Haida Nation off the north coast of British Columbia in Canada. On this show, we look at travel’s role in making a better world, and we highlight leading destinations and changemakers. Our guests are taking local action that the world can learn from, they’re helping to regenerate ecosystems, communities and economies, and they’re often making positive change happen from the bottom up.

Many of the voices we’ve highlighted are part of the Destination Think Collective, a peer group of ambitious, forward thinking destinations working toward a better future for travel and the planet. Members represent places like Banff and Lake Louise, or Cape Breton in Canada. Seattle in the United States, Copenhagen in Denmark, Queenstown Lakes in Aotearoa, New Zealand, and several more.

Today marks the beginning of our second season based in Tofino, British Columbia, or Načiks, as it’s also known. I’ve been looking forward to this season for quite a while now, and I’m very excited to share it with you. Partly that’s because I was on the ground for this one doing the interviews, and I got to know each of our guests a little bit face to face.

They each really inspired me in their own ways, and I left with my brain and my heart feeling full after our three days of interviews. Before we get into why that is, I want to set the scene a little bit and refresh your memory in case you’re not too familiar with Tofino. Tofino is a small town located on the territory of the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation, which is one of 14 Nuu-chah-nulth Nations located on the west coast.

Tofino is at the end of the road on the west side of the incredibly scenic Vancouver Island in Canada. To visitors, they’re known for activities like beaches, surfing, and whale watching in the summer. In the winter, storm watching is a popular activity, as long as you have the comfort of a beachfront resort, perhaps.

I took the bus into Tofino, and we stopped in Ucluelet, about 25 kilometers down the road. Greeted by a rainbow behind a sign that says, welcome to Ukee. You couldn’t ask for a better intro to the area, really. Ucluelet is another small community where you’ll find surf shops, a marina, and also the Cedar House Gallery, the business owned by one of today’s guests.

Over the past few decades, the Tofino area has transitioned from fishing and logging to tourism as its primary industry, and it shares many struggles with other popular destinations. As I heard from our guests. For example, housing is expensive and in short supply, which pushes some people out of town.

Economic inequality between Indigenous and non Indigenous people is another major issue. There are water shortages sometimes in the summer when tourism is at its peak. Looking at visitor behavior, there are sometimes problems with backcountry camping and the mess that gets left behind. And a side note there, on the bus pulling into Tofino, I heard a backpacker say, I’m gonna stay in the bush, when the driver asked where he needed to go.

And I assume that means he was going to put up a tent somewhere. I hope he stayed dry. I learned a lot about local challenges, but I also came away encouraged by the positive momentum I felt from everybody, because it seems like more people than ever are eager to collaborate across cultures to find the right path forward.

And some of those people are working at Tourism Tofino, which is our sponsor for this season. Before we get to today’s guests, here’s a quick word from executive director, Brad Parsell.

Brad Parsell: Hi, I’m Brad Parsell, Executive Director at Tourism Tofino. We’re so excited to welcome you to this second season of Travel Beyond based in Tofino.

We’re a proud sponsor of this season, and we look forward to hearing all the upcoming interviews with community leaders who are inspiring us all to find the best path forward. You know, these podcast episodes are interesting to listen to for anyone who loves this part of the world, but it’s been really amazing what the podcast has done locally here in Tofino as we give a platform to residents and leaders doing inspiring things.

It’s really helped with the conversation around sustainable tourism, with building relationships across the community and across cultures, and uncovering the great work that, um, that frankly some of the world could learn from. Uh, we’ve also re broadcast some of these podcast episodes on our local radio station, and it’s just been really, really cool to learn from each other.

The Travel Beyond Podcast project extends far beyond Tofino, by the way. This show has covered leading sustainability solutions in the travel industry for many international destinations. Uh, and some of these destinations are part of a group called the Destination Think Collective. There’s places like Queenstown in New Zealand, Noosa in Australia, Copenhagen in Denmark, Bend in Oregon in the United States, all working with us in Tofino as we share best practices and innovative solutions about the future of travel and how we can make it work for everybody in our community.

So it’s been super fascinating and, uh, this Travel Beyond podcast is an extension of some of that work. And I’m really, really excited. There’s been many, uh, local sustainability solutions put forward that affect travel in the first season that we did on Tofino. Uh, we’d had Indigenous Elder Moses Martin, uh, and Joe Martin on the legacy of the Meares Island protest to protect old growth forests.

Uh, we heard from Saya Masso and Julian Hockin-Grant on the Tribal Park Allies Program. Gisele Martin spoke. Uh, a lot about the Tribal Park Guardians and, uh, the ʔiisaak Pledge. Uh, we also had Tyson Atleo and Richard George from a Ahousaht First Nation talking about their environmental stewardship efforts.

And we had Emily Fulton and Michelle Hall about teaching visitors the value of restoration. So it was an amazing first season of Travel Beyond based on Tofino. If you haven’t listened to it, highly encourage you to check it out. And it’s all about showing travellers what it means to visit respectfully, and that’s a big part of this new season.

I’d really like to, um, show gratitude and thank today’s guests, Hjalmar Wenstob and Timmy Masso, who are doing really awesome work trying to revitalise Nuu chah nulth culture. They’re also sharing a lot of their knowledge with other locals and visitors. And, uh, I’m really, really excited about their episode today.

So thanks for listening and enjoy the episode.

David Archer: Today we’re speaking with two brothers, Timmy Masso and Hjalmar Wenstab, who come from the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation. Both have been working to make the Tla-o-qui-aht and Nuu-chah-nulth cultures more visible and audible. Timmy is a language advocate and a teacher, and from a very young age, he’s been working to educate people about the Nuu-chah-nulth language, which he says has been on the verge of extinction.

Hjalmar is a carver, artist, and the owner of the Cedar House Gallery in Ucluelet that I mentioned. This episode, you’ll learn about their many collaborations, their roles in keeping the Nuu chah nulth culture alive, and how that all interacts with visitors. You’ll also hear about a provocative and popular series of local events they’ve hosted called Ask an Indian.

This was such a fun conversation, and so without further ado, let’s get into it. And welcome back to Tofino. 

Timmy Masso: Uqlaasish chawatua. Uqlaasish Timothy Mossu. Histaqshitl tlaoquit. Haya’ta yu’u tluatlet ha’hutli. I just introduced myself and my language. I said my Nuu chah nulth name is Chawatua. My English name is Timothy Masso. I am from Tla-o-qui-aht. It’s the land were gathered here on today, but I live in Ahousaht territory. Uh, I’m a language advocate and a teacher.

Hjalmer Wenstob: My name is Hjalmer Wenstob. My traditional name is Tlehfek. I come from the Tla-o-qui-aht First Nation. I live at Tayistanis, which is one of our communities by Long Beach. And, uh, I’m a full time artist and carver, as well as a business owner. We run an Uklulut. 

David Archer: Great. And you have a growing family, I heard.

Hjalmer Wenstob: Yeah, we’re up to three now.

David Archer: Three little kids. Congratulations. 

Hjalmer Wenstob: Yeah, thank you very much.

David Archer: Yeah. Awesome. Can you, and this can go to either one of you, but can you tell me about your connection to the area?

Timmy Masso: Yeah, like I said, we’re, here we are gathered in Tla-o-qui-aht territory. That’s where my, my family’s from. My dad is Trent Masso and is, is ancestry goes right back to our, our great, great, great, great grandfather, Tlehpika.

And that’s where our last name, Masso, comes from. So our, our people have been here for, well, since the beginning of time. And that’s, it’s a pretty big part of living here. And, uh, Tofino is now situated in actually one of our old reserves, our village sites. Uh, and so our connection has been always very deeply rooted in, in who we are.

David Archer: Great. Uh, Hjalmer, anything to add to that?

Hjalmer Wenstob: Yeah, I mean, both as a carver, as an artist myself, and my brother doing work in language, I think it really gives us another view of our, of our culture and of our territory, and really opens a world up for us to understand it more. And, you know, just Tim here has been learning our language since he was a very young man, and learning his language has really helped us connect not only to our territory, but to specific sites, and then find those connections back through our ancestry.

We were talking earlier about my growing family. And, uh, and my children, my son’s name comes from one of our great ancestors who had a village at the base of what’s now called Radar Hill. And that name, Tsinkwa, has carried through the family and brought, seven generations later, my son. And it really connects him to that place as well, and he feels when he goes to that, that location, which is now called Radar Hill, it’s now in Parks Canada, but he feels that connection that he has to that place.

And so as a carver, as an artist, we have taken a responsibility to start putting art up through our, our whole Haudenosaunee, our whole traditional territory, to mark all these important sites, not just for our family, but for our, our whole nation.

David Archer: Yeah, so you’re involved in some, you know, revitalization of the language and, and culture.

You know, you talked a little bit about the seven generations and that perspective. Is there anything else you’d want to add about how that heritage might give you a different perspective on the world from other places?

Hjalmer Wenstob: Well, I think that people who are visiting Tofino, you know, they’re just getting a maybe a glimpse at most of our culture.

And so in the last few years, we both have been looking to take on more roles to educate visitors and public who are coming here. And Tim doing language work and revitalizing has really seen that the language is ours, but it’s also ours to share. And it’s ours to speak so others can hear it, and then they can ask what they’ve heard.

And so Timmy has been working with the co op, uh, local stores in town, street signage, trying to put place names up where they belong. And a place like Tofino, which we see now as a municipality or a town or a city, And it has visitors from all around the world. But what it really is, is Tla-o-qui-aht. It is one of our biggest village sites.

And that education that we’re trying to put back on the land, and myself, I’m not a politician, and I’m, you know, I’m not going to go out and run for mayor, but we thought what we should do is start putting the art up where it belongs. And so, over the last five or six years, Timmy and myself and our whole family, We carve two poles every year, and we put two poles up in our territory.

So one goes to our communities, which are now reserves, and the other one goes up in a space that may be more public, but an important site for our people. And every year we put up two. And we’ve been doing that so people understand when they come into our territory, that they’re here, but they’re here as invited visitors.

And I think it’s really important for everyone to start knowing more about where they are. And that work that Tim has been doing for our people. We’re seeing a desire from others as well.

David Archer: Yeah, that’s fantastic. Two polls a year is a, is a big job. It’s a tiring feat sometimes. No kidding. Okay, well, yeah.

Timmy, let’s talk a little bit about language. Like, I’m interested to know, um, how you began working in, with the Nuu-chah-nulth language and, and how that’s taken you.

Timmy Masso: Yeah, well, it, you know, it really first started when I was in elementary school. So, uh, when I was in about grade two or three, uh, we actually had an elder from Ucluelet First Nation come into the school and, and teach language with us.

And growing up, you know, being in that class, being able to hear language, it, it felt like home. Uh, my dad, he’s actually a silent speaker, so he can understand the language, but he doesn’t speak it. Uh, and he would share often, you know, how to count to ten little words like chukwa, come here, and, and smaller little kind of nuggets of information that you would hold on to.

Yeah. Uh, and it was actually when Hjalmer had a brain operation when he was 19. Uh, he was going to University of Victoria. So, my mum and I moved down there to support, support him while he was there. And the elders that were at the First People’s House at the University of Victoria. would bring them aside and brush them down and cleanse them to give them strength.

And seeing how much strength that their language had, it, it really kind of drove me to, to want, want to learn more of my language. So, once Hjalmer was, you know, getting back going and, and feeling better, we returned home and I had this big want to, to hear more of my language. And so, coming back into grade six, There was again a space for it, but sadly there was the at that time the elder had actually passed away And so the the school was kind of trying to juggle how to fit in a language class without having support to do it so I actually stepped aside from school and started to kind of advocate within the school to to bring Elders and community members in and there was a found out there was a very huge gap in that because the education system, you have to be an accredited teacher.

You can’t just have someone from the community come in and teach a class. Uh, so that slowly led into, finally we were able to bring in elders to the class. And we had a smaller space, but at that point I was moving on to high school. And again, faced that same problem all over again. And Hjalmer was working with Assembly of First Nations.

And he was stepping down from his position as a youth representative. And we went to this meeting that was in Victoria and there was people from all across Canada, people from the Ministry of Education, the government of Canada, all there talking about how great they’re doing with bringing back language.

Okay. How the government of Canada is bringing back Indigenous languages.

David Archer: Okay.

Timmy Masso: And hearing this as, you know, a 14 year old hearing that the government’s bringing back the language but it’s not in our schools, our youth aren’t hearing it. From our perspective as Indigenous people, it was on the verge of extinction.

And so I was sitting in this meeting, hearing this, you know, all these people, all these officials talk about what great work they’re doing, but not seeing it on the ground. And so I asked a chief for time to speak, and got up and said that this isn’t happening. It may look great on paper, you may think you’re bringing it back, but our elders are passing away, we don’t have language in the schools.

And that led me on a quite a long journey of going to meetings after meetings across BC, across Canada, and actually down into the States as well, until universities started to pick up and decided to offer a language program. And so it started with a two year diploma program that later laddered into an education.

And so, uh, I was able to enter in at, 15. So I entered into the University of Victoria’s language program, uh, and was there to kind of see where it was going. Cause at the time, again, everyone was, it was this new idea of trying to bring back language that universities didn’t actually understand what direction to go in yet.

So it was quite amazing to see cause we had elders from up and down the Nuu-chah-nulth area come to Port Alberni and UVic actually put on courses in our territory. So we didn’t have to go down to Victoria. And we got to come together as, as people and had the professors come as facilitators. They weren’t there to teach the course.

They were there to facilitate and make sure that the elders had a space to teach. So it was a two year program just focused on learning language, and then that laddered into an education program. So I had the honor of being able to do those first two years, and then later an education program. So I graduated last year with a a degree with a specialty in Nuu-chah-nulth language.

David Archer: Amazing. So it sounds like you’re on the cusp of something new. 

Timmy Masso: Yeah. Well, I think there’s, there’s been so many, you know, really amazing people that have been advocating for language. And I think I stepped in just right at the right time. You know, there was so many people that have been fighting, you know, their whole life to bring back language, bring awareness that our language is being lost.

I had the honour of working with so many elders that have actually sadly passed away now. But, you know, there was, it’s not a new thing to our people, but it was a new thing to hear that, you know, languages are going extinct. And with elders in our communities, uh, we’ve been trying to, just like Hjalmer said, make it more available for everyone.

You know, it’s not just a language that I’m, I’m holding. I want to make sure that if you’re living in our territories, you can learn a bit of our language as well. And that’s why we’ve worked with the local co ops to put in language within the store. And even if it’s just a few words here and there, It kind of raises that awareness and more locals see it and want to learn more and that kind of sparks the question of, you know, bringing people into Hjalmer’s gallery, bringing people into the nations and understanding where our languages come from.

David Archer: Amazing. So, what’s something that you think that, um, the Nuu-chah-nulth language can do? Teach us, or can teach you, or what does it bring?

Timmy Masso: Yeah, well, you know, as we learned their language, as I was on my journey of learning language, I felt so much more connected to my land. So English, you know, we have 26 letters in the alphabet.

It’s, from a standpoint of, you know, us learning as first language speakers of English, it seems very easy. As a second language speaker coming into English, it can be very confusing. So Nuu-chah-nulth, instead of having a C that can make an S or a K sound, we have four different types of C’s. And it’s overwhelming at first because there’s 45 letters in the alphabet.

Okay. But once you learn them all, you can read words very easily. And I found with learning that, you can hear the sounds within the land. So our language, Nuu chah nulth language, I, in my opinion, is directly tied to our lands. So there’s sounds that really only exist here. If, if you go down the coast down to even Bamfield, it sounds different.

You know, being here on Long Beach, being here in Tofino, It’s got this power. The waves are always crashing on the shore. You got this current that’s always going through Tofino and I found that that the language here, which is the central dialect, has, you know, been shaped by our land. And you move down the coast and the language is, it’s still Nuu chah nulth language, but it, the dialect shifts and it seems almost softer being in Barkley Sound.

So, in my opinion, learning just even a little bit of Nuu chah nulth can give you more of a connection to where you live.

David Archer: So are you teaching language now, or what’s next for you? 

Timmy Masso: Well, I’ve actually been so busy with so many other projects, I actually just had the honour of coming back from a trip from Australia and New Zealand on a youth exchange, promoting uh, culture and also tourism.

So, I’ve been on so many different, uh, opportunities to showcase culture that I haven’t had the chance to get into schools yet and teach. Uh, but, when I did my practicum in Tofino at the elementary school, I was there for about nine weeks, and so many youth that were in the, in the school had this want to, to hear the language, to speak the language.

And so, I kind of shifted my course to, you know, the primary focus was, you know, learning our language. You know, from there, we would talk about mathematics, talk about science, but it would all be grounded in a Nuu chah nulth worldview. And I think with that, so many youth really did understand where they were.

You know, they weren’t just living in Tofino, they were living, you know, in Kwisaks, where, where one of our villages were. They could go down to the beach and hear those sounds of, of the seagulls, the quinny, and all these animals that are there, and it gave them so much more drive to learn. For me, it’s been really, uh, I’ve been wanting to get back into the schools and, and, and start teaching, uh, but I’ve been so, so busy.

So many opportunities now. So many opportunities, yes. 

David Archer: Yeah, that’s incredible. Yeah. Maybe we’ll come back to, to the promoting tourism abroad, too. Yeah. That sounds interesting. Yeah. But I have one more question before I switch to Hjalmer. Is there a name that you prefer to call Tofino, the location where it is now?

Timmy Masso: Yeah, well, there’s, there’s a few different names that are out there. Uh, Načiks is one that most people know. Uh, and it actually refers to just the point of Tofino. So, there’s, because our language with our alphabet, you know, having 45 letters, everything has got a specific name for a place. So, it’s not just, you know, one location has that one name.

If you go down, you know, a bit further into the harbour, it is called Kwisaks, uh, which kind of means on the other side. So, usually you would be coming around and you would you would see this the point and then on the other side of the point where the village would be so there’s so many different names for Tofino in different locations that it’s kind of hard to yeah have one name one.

Yeah but you know elders some some elders say Kwisaks for Tofino others go with Načiks. I think a lot of people know Načiks is kind of the the term for Tofino, but I think again, it’s, it’s very hard with our language because our language is so scientific and so very specific with, with everything that it’s not really just one name for one location.

David Archer: Right, and it’s not a direct translation from, yeah, exactly. Yeah Yeah, so you’ve been busy with language opportunities Hjalmer, let’s talk about your art and your gallery. Can you, well first of all

Hjalmer Wenstob: He missed a few things, uh, talking about being a busy person, uh, in that, in that gap year from doing his practicum to now.

Tim’s also been alongside my family, my little family, we’ve been writing a number of children’s books, uh, as language resources. So I think we have about five or six. Now, uh, that we’ve published through the gallery and made as local resources because there’s really no resources for learning the language and Timmy having his education degree.

Said well, this is how we need to build a curriculum and you can’t just jump in with full fluency you have to start, you know with baby steps and those building blocks and he literally went off and made alphabet blocks for people to learn and that led to card games and it led to all these different resources and the most recent was a number of books including counting books that are fluent in the language and those being given out to all the daycares and the schools around has been an amazing resource that Timmy’s been a big involvement in and, uh, and just one note on the school and the class that he was teaching, the grade two, three class, we had a totem pole raising in Yukua, in Yukua territory at the high school and the local elementary school came and performed three of Timmy’s songs that he had taught the class and they taught it to the rest of the school and they came in full regalia and, and performed to me songs and, uh, and Indigenous and non Indigenous students all together singing and, uh, to say it didn’t bring a lot of tears to everyone’s eyes would be an understatement because it was just such a beautiful thing to witness and that community building element.

And that was to me, you know, just with what, nine weeks of a practicum able to bring that to the students. And that was a really beautiful experience for myself as a brother and as a community member to see.

David Archer: Yeah, uh, well, maybe the songs are a good segue because I also, the other day, watched on YouTube a, I think it was a COVID 19 healing song?

Mm hmm. Uh, can you tell me a bit about that and how you work together?

Hjalmer Wenstob: Uh, when the pandemic hit, it locked down our communities extremely tight. And Tla-o-qui-aht, you know, historically we had smallpox and tuberculosis that were actually introduced to our people intentionally, and the population of Tla-o-qui-aht dropped by about 90 percent when when smallpox, the pandemic a smallpox was introduced to our people.

When the first whisperings of COVID started, our nation took it extremely seriously, knowing that what had happened in the past, we’re not going to let history repeat itself. And so our communities were very, very locked down. And even within the communities were very locked down. So I started carving and Timmy started writing a song and we were going to bring them together as a, as a performance, more of a fun song, which, so it’s not a sacred song.

It’s not a song that would be put away. It would be a song that was actually meant to come out and be used. And we worked on this for almost a year, uh, again in separate households. And Timmy was really struggling with, with finding the right lyrics to bring into a song in a time that was so painful, in a time that was so just, you know, the unknown was, was at the forefront.

And so Timmy reached out to a few of our elders at home, and they said, we don’t need to just record this, we need to heal from this. And so they said to me, you have to write a song about healing, about bringing our people back, uh, and back together, but not just back together, you know, physically, but emotionally and spiritually.

Timmy Masso: At first we were trying to document COVID. And in our language, talking about, you know, a small little virus with spikes all over it is a hard thing to describe. Yeah. Especially with, you know, having to make up words to describe that, that virus or describe what it is. I spent weeks trying to build words, weeks talking to elders, trying to figure out how to move forward with that.

And like Hjalmer said, it led into our elders saying, we need healing. Our, we, our people need healing first. And so the song, in the song we’re saying, let there be no sickness, help us, we are strong. And it was meant really as a way to, you know, as almost like a, a way to bring healing to our households. Like Hjalmer said, so many people couldn’t gather, our nations couldn’t gather, but being able to play a song on their computer in their house made that kind of almost a small feeling of having our, our gatherings where our families could come together and sing.

And so it was just a way that, that us as brothers could kind of give back to our nation and bring healing to ourselves as well.

David Archer: Yeah, thanks for sharing that. Hjalmer, can we talk a little bit about your art world as well? Um, yeah. Aside from collaborations with Timmy or, or maybe, or maybe including.

Alongside, alongside. Yeah, tell me what you’re working on typically or, or what’s your field of expertise?

Hjalmer Wenstob: So I, I’m a full time carver, wood carver, uh, and I love totem poles and regalia for, for the community. And, uh, and then that led to opening Cedar House Gallery. So we have a gallery that’s been taking a lot of our time away from carving over the last few years.

But, uh, yeah, I mean, that’s, that’s where my first passion lies, I think. And, and something I can do with my entire family. So my kids are involved, even if they’re, even if they’re just little ones. Okay. And, uh, and bringing the whole family together, really, I mean. I can’t think of the last project that I’ve worked on that I haven’t had Tim and mom and dad present and helping with, uh, with the projects.

And we’re also lucky enough to live right in the very center of our community and, uh, we carve out in the, in the front yard with everyone coming by and stopping. And usually the coffee pot has to stay on all day long. Okay. It’s, it’s something that really just brings people together. It’s, it’s something that creates that community that, you know, sometimes it’s hard to do in this day and age.

Carving isn’t just an active, you know, art or, or an active work. It’s, it’s really about bringing something from the past, back to life again. And, uh, and being able to tell those stories and bring those stories back out. And a totem pole doesn’t just get carved in a day and it doesn’t get carved by one person.

Really. It’s, it’s a whole team of people. And, uh, and the elders behind that are telling those stories and remembering them for us and, and our job to bring those stories back to life. And, and so the last number of years. Like I said, I’ve been wanting to put poles back up in the territory where they used to belong.

Looking at Canadian history, not as much Tla-o-qui-aht history, but Canadian history has had a really big impact on our people in the last 150 or 200 years. But our history goes back since time immemorial. So we have thousands and thousands of years of history, but we are constantly defined by the last 200 years.

And the 200 years of history that we’re defined by is someone else’s history. It’s Canadian history that’s been brought to us and put upon us. And so I feel that art kind of bridges that gap and almost sometimes jumps right over it and focuses on the history of the last, you know, millennial that we’ve lived and our people have lived and experienced and brings it into something that everyone can understand.

Everyone can digest and everyone can see it as something beautiful. But what they’re getting is, is stories told for thousands of years. And, and so that’s been a, a really big honour for myself to be able to do that. Talking about that, that last 200 years of history, the Canadian history that impacts our life, there used to be 200 plus poles that lined the village of Meares Island of Opitsat.

And here I am using things like Meares, using these names. Opitsat, in our village, there was over 200 houses and 200 poles that lined the beach. And, uh, and in the act of 15 minutes, Captain Grey and a gunship totally burnt down the whole village, leveled the whole village. And then turned the ship around and leveled the village which is now Tofino.

One of the biggest longhouses, big houses on the entire coast, stood where the, what’s now the, the post office in Tofino. Wow. And uh, the gunship after destroying Opitsat, it turned around and destroyed that entire village which has never been put back up. Those 200 poles that line the beach were gone, you know, again thousands and thousands of years of history to be put up and and then just taken away and so I told my wife about this and and said wouldn’t it be amazing to see 200 poles go back up in Tla-o-qui-aht and, uh, and she said, yeah, okay.

And, and started applying for funding sources to help us do that. So every year we put up two. And, uh, and then now I’ve seen Joe Martin put up two poles as well. And Joe David put up, uh, another pole in, in, in Tofino. And Joe Mar or Joe Martin again and his family putting up poles, uh, in the park. And, and it just growing and growing and growing.

And, and now the nation’s probably at, I don’t know, near 20 poles in the last five years. And, and to see that happen. Is something that really inspires me and I’m really thankful. It really inspires my kids and that they get to be involved in that. And so I, I just see that growing and not just for our own pride and our own, you know, history being righted and, and, uh, not righted, but righted.

And, uh, but also for those who are coming to visit to understand us a little bit more and to see those and say, okay, well, you know, now I know that someone else is here and that’s important. I mean, we were putting up a poll this past, uh, August. And, uh, and someone stopped and asked what we were doing while we were lifting it up.

And, and she said, so is this, is this First Nations land then? And this is someone who planned their trip for the last five years to come to Tofino and, and ask that question. But that’s exactly what you want, is someone to ask that question. And we said, yeah, this is Tla-o-qui-aht territory. And, and she was so thankful, ran off and got her whole family.

And they, their mission was to learn how to say Tla-o-qui-aht instead of Clayoquot. Amazing. And, and that, it feels small, but it also feels momentous in, in a lot of ways. And, uh. And just putting our presence back where it’s always been for everyone to know that we’re here and not in protest and not in, in, in anger, but really in saying you have to know where you are because we have to, we have to turn the corner a little bit.

It’s been too separate for, for a long time and it’s been extractive for a long time and now we’re noticing that and I think everyone’s kind of catching on. It’s time to change that, that narrative and that story to be together. And to be able to see the benefit of being together and finding a way forward together.

David Archer: Yeah, well I want to talk a bit about how that culture spreads to both visitors and residents around here. Um, and I noticed that you have a podcast called Ask an Indian. Can you tell me a little bit about that series and how that came about?

Hjalmer Wenstob: Yeah, the Ask an Indian podcast, which aired for all of one episode before I forgot to make the second one.

Was it only one? It was only one. Oh, okay. It’s turned into something else, which, which I think is really wonderful, because we just had a session with, uh, Tofino Arts Council and the Cultural Roundtable in Tofino where we had a number of non profits and, and stakeholders in the area coming together and we hosted Ask an Indian as an, an informal session.

Okay. So it moved away from the podcast method into more of a dialogue, a live, uh, live dialogue, and we’ve done that a number of times now, and so it kind of took a new life, which, to me, is much more engaging, and to me, it takes, the humor is still there, but it’s done, you know, just as a circle dialogue where we talk, and really, you get the opportunity to ask us, token Indians, questions, and we, as token Indians, answer questions, and then it grows deeper and deeper and deeper, because when it’s you know, stakeholders of the area, of course, people aren’t just asking generalized questions about First Nations in Canada, but asking about what it is to be Tla-o-qui-aht and, and language and connection to place.

And it’s grown to be a lot more intimate in that space. It’s grown to be a lot more about, you know, people from home, talking to other people from home, and getting the opportunity to understand each other a bit more. Uh, when it first started, it was really kind of tongue in cheek, because I was, um, asked to be a guest artist in, in a theater production of all things.

Okay. And the theater production brought in these core artists and we were to support these emerging artists to create work. And the core artists were all Indigenous and the emerging artists were all non Indigenous. And it became that we were having to constantly, and I was having to constantly educate.

And also I was, we were kind of tasked to hold their emotions for them. And it felt. Not backwards, but it felt, uh, kind of extractive. And, and so I said at the end of one of the meetings, I said, I don’t know if this is for me anymore. I don’t think that this project is for me anymore. I feel like I’m just a hotline for people to ask an Indian and get guilt off their chest.

Yeah. And, and I said, I, I don’t know if this is for me. And, uh, and the owners of the production company said, great, yeah, that’s what it feels like. Okay, you want to make an artwork about that? And, and really gave me free range to do anything I wanted. So I reached out to everyone and said, okay, let’s make a podcast, ask an Indian, call in with the phone number, send me an email and I’ll answer your questions.

And we put that out to this group and not one person called. And not one person sent an email because they felt like they were being called out. They felt that I was, you know, you know, silencing them. And when I was trying to do the exact opposite and say, here’s your, your outlet, here’s your opportunity.

And, uh, so we pressured them a few more times until finally we got enough. And the questions that came in were 90 percent ridiculous because I think people were attempting to, you know, create a question instead of having the one that was actually on their mind. And, uh, so we sat down together one night and we listened to all the questions and we said, we can’t answer these seriously because they’re not really serious questions.

So we, we created, it was pretty numerous production created, we created characters. Uh, I became an elder and he became nephew or grandson or son, moon child, or moon child, whatever he became. And he was there to just bring me coffee while I, you know, made fun of these questions while also giving answers, uh, if there is ever such a thing as an answer.

And then that grew. ’cause uh, Tofino Arts Council heard it and they said, ah, can you do that again? Could we do that live? We could film it. And I said, well, let’s just do it without filming it without recording it so people don’t feel nervous or naive and, and they don’t want to be wrong. But when it came to the last round table we did, I said, is anyone gonna ask the question about taxes?

’cause you all think you understand how Indigenous taxes work. And there was a lawyer and he finally said, okay, I, I’ll ask ’cause I think I know you guys don’t pay taxes. Right? And, and uh, and we said, no. See, this is what I mean. You thought you knew, you thought you were so educated in that we do pay taxes or, yeah.

Dad has paid land transfer tax when he had to buy his house. Like, we pay taxes if we don’t live on reserve. And this education that happened, everyone went, oh, we all didn’t ask the question because we thought we knew. And these are neighbors. These are friends. These are people you go shopping at the grocery store together with and stand in line.

And, and we assume we know so much and, uh, and there’s so much that we don’t. And so really it’s an opportunity just for dialogue. And so it’s left the podcast realm and became more of a public setting, but it’s, I think, in that grown to be a really beautiful thing. And it’s also funny though, when local Tofitians say like, oh, I did the Ask an Indian thing, and everyone kind of stares at them.

Uh, and we named it that intentionally to say like, we have to talk about terminologies again, because people don’t know. What is the proper terminologies and we thought coming in strong, maybe we’ll get people to ask those questions that are seemingly difficult, even though they’re very easy for us to answer.

And it’s grown to be something quite beautiful, really.

David Archer: That’s great. In that spirit, can I ask a question?

Hjalmer Wenstob: Yeah, of course. 

David Archer: On behalf of visitors, because when I go places, I do want to learn about the culture and I want to learn a bit of the language too. So do you, do you guys want white people or other settlers?

Is it helpful for us to use your language when we visit? Is that helpful? Does that, what do you think? 

Hjalmer Wenstob: Yeah,I mean, the, the hard thing is, is, is finding the balance of do we want people at all? You know, that’s the first, that’s the first question. And, and at some points we say no, you know, and, and there was times looking at the pandemic again, where the nation and, and our people said, why are people still visiting Tofino?

We don’t. We don’t have the capacity for you as, as, not as Indigenous or non Indigenous, just presence. We can’t have it right now. And there were times we had to fight against our own communities to say, this is our territory. And at some point we’re going to say, people have to stop coming for a little bit. You know, we need to heal a little bit.

David Archer: Yeah.

Hjalmer Wenstob: You know, not even in that time, it was truly healing, uh, with a hospital with 10 beds. We didn’t have the ability to invite people. When it comes to that conversation is a whole different one, which I think we should have. Uh, I’m not sure if we’re ready for that conversation yet and what that looks like.

But in terms of using our language and asking questions, you know, that’s what I strive for in our space, in our gallery. We found that everyone is so hungry for information, and the only information that they come equipped with is what they see in social media or on the news, which is, again, talking what we spoke about earlier, that 150 years of history that we don’t really relate to all that much.

And, and that’s not our people. You know, the, the hard times that have come upon us, those aren’t what defines our nations. We have beautiful histories, we have beautiful structures and systems and governance, and we have, you know, the history that lays behind us, which is also what lays the path ahead of us, is what we want to be defined by.

And that is so rooted in our language and in our art and in our culture and who we are as people and the way we live on this land. And we’re proud to talk about it. We’re proud to share it. And so we actually wrote a guidebook this year. And, uh, and because we were having those people come in, finally asking questions, I think the pandemic in some ways helped people learn a little bit more, I think it kind of got to the forefront, truth and reconciliation.

And that. Even just that term in itself came to the forefront. And so we’ve seen a big change in the last five years as business owners, as a gallery owner.

David Archer: Like from visitors coming in? 

Hjalmer Wenstob: From visitors coming in that really want to learn more. And they want to learn more about where they are. As simple as that.

First off, where am I? I know I’m not just in Tofino and Ucluelet. And wanting to learn about the people that are here. And wanting to learn about the language that they see on the street signs. And wanting to learn so much more than what we were seeing five years previous. Which was and I was really shocked that there was Indigenous people here still.

And we’re having visitors from around the world, so, you know, maybe general Canadians knew a little bit more, but we were also shocked how little there was out there for people to go and learn about our people.

David Archer: What’s interesting has been such a short time frame of change. 

Hjalmer Wenstob: Very quick turnaround. And, and to the point where we were running the gallery and I would weekly, daily have to ask people to leave the gallery for. Uh, extreme racism that was coming into our space where we were a space of education as much as we were an art gallery. Uh, I was carving in the space. Timmy was teaching language in the space. And it was a space where elders would come and sit and the coffee pot truly is on all day because elders would come and sit around the table.

And we just. And so we wanted to keep it a safe space and we’d have visitors coming in with a lot of maybe a lack of education or maybe misinformation and now what we’re seeing is intense excitement about learning and having nowhere to go to learn. And so the gallery with the books that we’ve been writing is really part to fill that answer.

And so we created a guidebook of the local area. We created a guidebook that has a chapter on language, a chapter on art, our creation story, the two nations, and a little bit, it’s all from the perspective of my gallery, more or less. Because I don’t want to write from anyone else’s perspective or tell anyone else’s story.

And, uh, and in that our songs are involved, so people can hear our songs, people can hear parts of our language. We give them the alphabet so they can, you know, learn a little bit. And things like hello and goodbye and thank you, which when someone says to me, makes me light up. You know, when someone leaves the gallery and says, that’s true.

Which just means, for now, or see you next time. You know, that brings so much joy to me. And when someone says Tleko, when they’re, when they’re saying thank you for doing something, and they’re a visitor that learned my language and then took the time to learn my language. That means so much to me and so really, I mean, I think that’s become a big part of our work is to educate and hope that people pick it up, you know, because otherwise it still has that extractive feel to it that, oh, it’s almost performative when we’re carving, when we’re speaking and, and we refuse to perform.

So it’s, uh, it’s important to find that way of just building a relationship.

David Archer: Timmy, I wanted to ask you about, uh, you mentioned tourism internationally. Can you tell me a bit about that and and if there’s a language connection there too?

Timmy Masso: Yeah, well most definitely it was it was kind of taking a step back looking at what the journey was.

I was invited by Indigenous Tourism BC as one of the youth from our area to go on a trip to promote tourism, but also talk about how tourism is done and how we can do it differently and so I had the honor of being there with there was about four other youth from British Columbia, and then there was ten youth from Australia, and ten youth from New Zealand.

Uh, and so we first started off in some pretty big locations, going out to the Great Barrier Reef, talking about, you know, the, the big ticket tourism things that you would go to.

David Archer: Yeah.

Timmy Masso: Uh, and then we later kind of stepped back, and went into the smaller communities, and saw, you know, the positives of tourism, but also the kind of downsides and so many people were, you know, their, their communities tourism was the thing that supported them but on the other hand so many people had kind of a bit of a sour taste in their mouth from it. You know, there’s housing prices have gone up all these things that used to be you know, very easy for locals to get instantly became a pretty expensive.

And so they saw so many people just like, you know, Tofino and Ucluelet. Uh, so many people are being priced out of their homes that they can’t afford it. And so for me, it was really amazing to, well, maybe amazing is the wrong word, but it made me feel like we weren’t alone. You know, we’re, we’re facing these challenges as Tla-o-qui-aht, as people living in Tofino, as youth, Lewis thought are up and down the coast.

So many people are starting to see this issue of housing prices, of food prices, of gas prices, things that locals that live here that, you know, are focused on either carving or, or going out fishing are being to the point where they can’t do that anymore. And so on this trip, we were focused on that, but after a while, so many youth decided that it was getting to the point where it hurt too much.

And so we kind of refocused on language and culture. And how, just like Hjalmer was saying, when in the last five years, even in their territories, so many people were coming and wanting to know more about. And so instead of focusing on just tourism and how we can do it differently, we’re talking about how we can reshape tourism as a whole.

And not have it just as, come see this place, but come learn about who we are. Come take a step into our, our territories from our perspectives. And so so many youth that were on the trip are actually starting their own tourism organizations and, and youth groups to first train their, their areas and, and train the youth in their area.

And then later on start a business to educate and, and not have tourism and promote tourism, but have a space for education. And through that, the people that we’re visiting can understand where they are and hopefully. Long term make make change for their areas.

David Archer: Did you get a sense of whether other Indigenous groups in other destinations are also feeling that people are becoming more receptive and open to it recently.

Timmy Masso: Yeah. Yeah, I think It’s quite amazing to see because you know going to Australia and New Zealand the amazing differences between our cultures Uh, I was shocked with how much language that the, the Maori had, they, they had so much language and it was everywhere. Yes. Every single street sign, we came into the airport in Auckland and there it was, right there, welcome in their language.

And it was something that made me so happy to see and also made the youth from Australia happy as well because I think they’re probably about five years behind us. You know, they’re they’re still fighting to get their language. They don’t have spaces like we do now and in our territories to learn their language. They’re still trying to fight to get that space available and they’re still trying to fight to get their elders recognized as these, you know. They may not have a degree, but they’re professors in their own, their own space.

And so being able to see those differences, but also how we as different nations can support each other and, and you know, one nation may be further ahead, but they’re sitting there ready to help us get to that level as well. I think for all of us, there was, you know, like I said, probably about 25 of us on the trip, 25 youth.

And I think at the end of it, all of us have built connections that will last a lifetime in supporting each other to make these spaces and make. You know, tourism that is right for us.

David Archer: Yeah, that’s wonderful. Yeah, thinking, I mean, I don’t want to say thinking big picture because we’ve been talking about millennia of culture here, but we are also talking about tourism in Tofino.

What do you want Tofino, including its tourism industry, to be like in 50 years from now?

Hjalmer Wenstob: I think that if you’re looking at the future of tourism as a whole, uh, and I don’t think it’s just for Indigenous people, I think it’s for the locals who have lived here and the families who have lived here for a long time.

And we see the same across our territories, across Indigenous territories, and around the world, I think we’re all trying to find some form of balance. And, and I think it’s, uh, at this point, I, I think Tla-o-qui-aht, or at least Tla-o-qui-aht members, we see that it’s out of balance and, and trying to find a way to bring it back.

That doesn’t mean we have an answer, and it doesn’t mean go to Tla-o-qui-aht and start begging for an answer of what balance looks like. But I think it’s something that we’re all trying to strive for, and uh, and it doesn’t have to just be on the backs of Tla-o-qui-aht to help do all that legwork, but creating relationships that can, can build that balance back.

I think tourism can exist in a good way, uh, but I think at the moment we’re seeing just the extractive elements of it, and you know, when we see us running out of water, uh, almost every summer and, uh, and yet we still see hot tubs full at, at resorts, we, we kind of start to scratch our head and, uh, and when we see the, the, you know, the price of living in Tofino, which has gone through the roof and, and really priced our, our own people and, and the old families of Tofino, uh, cause we have relationships with, you know, Tofino as a whole, and we’re seeing people have to leave and we’re seeing people, you know, it’s losing what the charm of a small town once was, and I think we’re all fearful of that, and I know, you know, having our business in Ucluelet, which is mocked as Tofino’s ugly sister, which I think is such a a horrible thing to say about, you know, it’s just something we should forget.

We should, we should forget that old terminology. But, Ucluelet, the people of Ucluelet are so fearful of becoming Tofino. And, and that’s sad to see two towns which work together to survive through the whole winter, and through the whole summer, fearful of becoming that, that bigger thing. Fearful of taking the next step.

Because we don’t want to lose what brought us all here. And we don’t want to lose what we’ve been here and our families have been here for so long protecting and so it’s about finding a balance where we can move forward. Knowing that tourism is the future that we are looking down at we’re knowing that that’s coming. So what you’re saying is and what we’re all trying to say is how do we get prepared for that to exist alongside us?

And honestly, at this point, we’re all very fearful of it, and I think it’s important to say it because tourism is, is the future now. And, and I run a business that relies on tourism, but we make it so that we don’t run ourselves ragged to do it. And, and as individuals, we have to find that balance. And we decided, even though we’re Tla-o-qui-aht members, to open a gallery in Ucluelet Territory.

And it was the reasoning is sad, and the reasoning is that Tofino’s just gotten away from itself. We love the town, and this is our territory. I mean, talking about the names of where we are, and talking about the place where we are, and yet we decided to go to a smaller town. Yeah. So we can still have a space where the coffee pot stays on all day, and elders can sit at the cash register and talk all day, and we can do that.

We can carve in the space, we can have our families there, we can have a community still. And when we talked to shops in Tofino before we opened the gallery, we went to other galleries and they said you couldn’t do that in this town. And that alone turned us away from being Tla-o-qui-aht members in our own territory, having a business that promotes Tla-o-qui-aht culture, promotes carving, promotes language.

And we moved to a different town to do it. And that in itself I think is a really big indicator of our fear of what Tofino has become. This is 10 years ago and where it’s going. And so there’s an importance of reeling it back into a place where. It can exist just enough to exist as what it is, which is a beautiful part of the world.

A beautiful part of the world that needs, you know, it is the end of the road. We know that it costs more to be at the end of the road. But at the expense of, of what it is, is, uh, it’s beauty, it’s water, it’s health, it’s, you know, environment. And, uh, and I don’t think we’re willing to risk that as, as Tla-o-qui-aht members.

Timmy Masso: I think for me, it comes back to, uh, teaching that we have in, in Nuu-chah-nulth Theory, which is ʔiisaak. Which means respect, uh, and it’s, our language can’t really be translated into English, it’s not a direct translation. ʔiisaak isn’t a teaching that, you know, we can just say, oh, respect, there we are, I taught you how to respect, now we can move on.

It’s something that is this lifelong lesson that, that comes up in times that you won’t expect it to. And I really think that, you know, if we can have tourism that is focused on respect, not just a word, but this life lesson that is so focused in our culture and in who we are, but also in our land. You know, just like Hjalmer said several years ago, it was too much.

There was too many people coming and not enough space to support them. And so, so many people were ending up on the back roads, back logging roads. It was a space where they could stay the night and then come back and go surfing in Tofino. And our territories couldn’t support it. And it got to the point where myself, I was driving down the road and looked down, it was the middle of August and there was campfires going all down this gravel road.

And it, we had just had, there was a forest fire that was happening on the other side of the, the summit. And it was almost like a, you know, alarm bells were going, but no one was, no one was going out to do anything. And so I was, I had the honor of having my, my brother, my mom and dad, and actually several locals from Ucluelet and Tofino come out and, not as protest, not as anger, but as a way to say enough.

We have to figure this out first before we can have this overwhelming, you know, not force, but just, there was too much. And so we were out there for about a week and educating people that this is, we have to first look after our land before we can have you come into our space. And there wasn’t, you know, RCMP and fire department were going out there every single day to put out fires or stop something that was happening.

And so, you know, as, as myself trying to bring people together, uh, it was quite shocking because we actually were able to bring in the mayor of Tofino, mayor of Ucluelet, the ACRD and all these organizations that at first were all kind of separated saying, oh, that’s not my problem. You know, it’s someone else’s jurisdiction.

We were able to kind of bring them all together. Get them all at a table so they can sit down and hopefully come up with a solution. And I know they’ve been working hard to to get that going and hopefully, you know, in the future we can better support people that are coming to our territories, but I think it really comes back to ʔiisaak.

It comes back to respect and within, you know, 50 years what we want tourism to look like, you know, we want teachers to be able to afford to stay in the community. So I was teaching in Tofino and my mentor teacher who was, in my opinion, he was amazing with the students. He was, the students loved him because he supported them, he cared for them, and he would love to live here, this would be his home, but he couldn’t afford to buy a house, he couldn’t afford to rent, and in the summertime, so many rentals become Airbnbs that there was no choice for him except to leave.

And so I think, you know, what I hope tourism to look like is that the people that are supporting the community, the locals that are here. You know, can stay here and, and we can bring that respect into so many different spaces we can bring ʔiisaak into not just, you know, the educational space, but into the retail market, into all these spaces where it’s not extractive, it’s giving back to the community, where it’s supporting the community.

So, you know, we can all move forward together, not just as, you know, one organization furthering themselves. But as, you know, these communities on the West Coast as a whole stepping forward into that next, next year.

David Archer: Thank you guys so much for your time. I feel like we could talk for a long time about culture and how it’s affecting us, but I just wanted to say thank you.

Hjalmer Wenstob: Yeah, well thanks for having us.

David Archer: This has been Travel Beyond presented by Destination Think, and I’d like to say klaków, or thank you, to Timmy Masso and Hjalmer Wenstab for joining us. For more resources and show notes, visit our website at DestinationThink.com. This episode was hosted, produced, and has theme music composed by me, David Archer, Sarah Raymond de Booy, my co producer, Lindsay Payne, Jamie Sterling, and Cory Price provided production support.

We’d like to thank Tourism Tofino for sponsoring this season of Travel Beyond. And for being a member of the Destination Think Collective, which is a growing group of very ambitious destinations that care about the future of travel and the planet. And if you like what you hear, please take a moment to give us a 5 star rating to help more people find our show.

Thanks for listening, and we’ll be back with more next week.