This week’s Wednesday Night Hike at Rithet’s Bog was the last of 2009. Before yesterday I had not ever done the Rithet’s Bog loop and as other new-to-me hikes tend to go, this one was pretty good. In case you’re a bit confused, since yesterday was Tuesday, not Wednesday, I did a run at Rithet’s Bog on Tuesday night and hiked with my work friends on Wednesday night.

The hike started at Royal Oak Centre on West Saanich Road, which gave us the opportunity to use the pedestrian tunnel under the Pat Bay Highway. Not that exciting, but still kind of interesting. After a bit of asphalt we got underway on the wide gravel path around the bog. The actual bog loop is only about 3km so we added on a bit extra by doing an out and back on Rolson Trail which ends at Royal Oak Drive. This being a night hike, the visual experience is a bit different than if it were in the daylight; the highlights were the pond decorated with Xmas lights near the end of Rolson Trail and what I think was a Barred Owl that was sitting on a branch right next to the trail (about 8ft in the air) towards the end of the hike. This was the best owl sighting I have ever had; we were about 10ft away and it just sat there looking at us as we looked at it — tres cool.

GPS Data (run on Tuesday): 6.4km / 0h36m / GPS Route
GPS Data (hike on Wednesday): 6.3km / 1h13m / GPS Route

A map of our hike route at Rithet's Bog near Victoria, BC. Click on the map to see detailed GPS data on the Garmin website.