B.C.’s San Josef Bay named one of the world’s best beaches

A remote hike-in bay at the tip of Vancouver Island has been named one of the world’s 50 best beaches.

The bay in Cape Scott Provincial Park is notable more for its pristine nature and breathtaking views than for its sunbathing — though you might get a chance to catch some rays if you go during high summer. Its annual average temperature, after all, doesn’t quite top 10 C.

It is only accessible by taking a 45-minute, family-friendly hike through rugged, largely undisturbed wilderness. But the travel experts who collaborate on the list rave about its scenery and sense of being away from it all.

San Josef ranks No. 36 on the list. The top three are Lucky Bay in Australia, Anse Source D’Argent in the Seychelles and Hidden Beach in the Philippines.

The cool-climate bay is an outlier on a list of mostly tropical and subtropical sunbathing gems, but wins points (10 out of 10, in fact) for its untouched nature. Also figuring in the rankings are how swimmable it is, average annual sunshine and average daily temperature.