I feel lucky to have seen them. Commercial whalers all but emptied the oceans of greys by the early twentieth century. These are a few of the eighteen thousand individuals that now ply the waters of the eastern Pacific, a testament to human compassion and foresight. They signify hope, these whales, that even the most harmful human behavior can be reversed with concerted commitment and hard work. This vantage point is our first stop on a seven-day hike of the West Coast Trail (WCT), a bone-jarring trek that stretches, roughly, along forty-five miles of Vancouver Island's pristine western coastline in Pacific Rim National Park. Originally carved out of the landscape to rescue shipwrecked sailors, the WCT has become one of North America's most rugged coastal treks, hosting thousands of backpackers a year from all over the world. Ironically, this notoriety has forced the WCT into an untenable position. Excessive and irresponsible use has created an identity crisis that threatens to spoil the paradox--rugged coastal beauty that is both remote and accessible--that made the trail such a mecca in the first place. This problem is not unique to the WCT; it plagues all our wilderness and recreation areas. National parks, especially those near large urban centers, like Banff National Park in Canada and California's Yosemite National Park, are becoming increasingly overcrowded. Both Canadian and American wilderness administrators have begun instituting a whole range of expensive permits and sticky regulations to keep overuse manageable.

"Unfortunately, with increasing populations and no increase in wilderness, that's the future," says Bruce Mason, coordinator of the University of Oregon's Outdoor Program. "Professional recreation programmers have made access so easy that they've encouraged overuse. Build it and they will come--and they are." As the popularity of the WCT increased in the 1960s and 1970s, trail improvements were made to protect hikers and the fragile ecosystem from each other's treachery--boardwalks cover easily damaged sections of the trail, ladders and bridges help hikers negotiate steep gullies, and cable cars span the many rivers and creeks that turn swift and dangerous in the rainy season. A quota and permit system was instated in 1992 to keep the number of trail users to a sustainable eight thousand hikers a year. Now administrators are considering more so-called improvements to reduce impact and injury. "The management of the trail is up for review because the users are changing," says Rod Blair, coastal marine assets manager of Pacific Rim National Park. "The West Coast Trail used to be for seasoned outdoors people who had lots of multinight backpacking experience. That's not the case anymore. Now we get people who have never backpacked before. We need to take that into consideration."

Critics, mostly the hard-core outdoor enthusiasts who once ruled the trail, charge that these improvements have already ruined the WCT. Before the quota, the complaint was crowds, but the issue now is quality, not quantity. The increasing number of inexperienced hikers has left WCT administrators with three choices: maintain the status quo and allow everyone to try their luck on a difficult route; force users to fulfill an "experience requirement" to qualify for a permit; or continue to undermine the integrity of the trail so it is accessible--and hazard-free--for everyone. Bud Ettinger, an outfitter who has hiked the West Coast Trail seventeen times over the last twenty-one years, has witnessed this metamorphosis firsthand. "A lot of experienced backpackers already sneer at the WCT. But the quota has reduced usage to a sane level. There used to be huge waves of more than one hundred people hiking the trail, staying in campgrounds that only had room for twenty-five. It may be time to screen users so only those with the necessary experience--and attitudes--get on. You've got to ask yourself, 'Is the trail only for present generations, or should it also be kept for future generations?'"