There were many skills I thought I'd master on my recent kayaking trip in B.C.'s Johnstone Straits, but learning how to burn used toilet paper hadn't made that list.

Sea Kayak Adventures promised a wilderness experience extraordinaire. They delivered; orcas, humpbacks, doll porpoises and eagles littered the landscape, the camp stove fare was gourmet and the guiding, expert.

I just hadn't counted on the burn-your-T.P.-in-the-coffee-can routine, though it did make for some interesting discussions.

Like one night on the Compton Island Indian Reserve: Nell Garvin, of Bellevue, Wash., sips her Merlot, and says, "I'm going to find an old coffee tin and tell my kids that I have mastered the art of the one-match burn. The key," she lifts her glass, "is poking it with a stick and holding it aloft."

Allen Early, 46, of Moore, S.C., shakes his head. "Nah. My method's better. I just light it before I use it."

The tour started in the basement of the Haida-Way Hotel in Port McNeill. Our new guides, Cara Andre and Dan Pichette, are eager and enthusiastic. Pichette asks us, "What are you hoping to gain from this trip?"

Less than 24 hours later, I'm sitting on a bluff above the aptly named Mossy Cove. A bull kelp forest fans out in the sparkling water below. My husband, Kevin, leans against a hemlock to read, while our tent glows with the last golden rays of the day.

I breathe deep bellyfuls of salty air scented with hot sap, and write in my journal about the seal and her pup we saw drifting through that morning's fog in Telegraph Cove. I remember too, the eagle wheeling down: talons out, grabbing something silver from the sea, before returning to its perch to shred it into sushi.

Johnstone Straits is renowned for rainy weather. Which is why our daily diet of blue-bowled skies and bleeding-sunsets is so special. Mornings start thick with fog, pushing its thick fingers into coves and leaving shaggy tendrils on rocks.

One night in North Bay, I sit with a glass of pinot noir. The fog begins blanketing the bay. I know that I am going to sleep like the dead again tonight.

Except Kevin and I wake together. The sound is close, filling the tent. I zip out, drawn towards the heavy blowhole exhalations. The moon illuminates the fog. I can see nothing but the glowing thickened air. But my ears are filled with the immense breathing of orcas.

Stories are what bind us. Shared experiences and their telling goes back to the time of the clan and cave. It doesn't matter if we're talking about the hydra-phone lowered in the sea to eavesdrop on killer whale gossip or if we're silently absorbing the sunset, these moments connect us to the earth and each other.

I wish I had mastered the one-match burn, but alas, it took several attempts to render T.P. into black flakes. But that process helped slow time.

Huddling over a coffee can with a small flame, while rays of sun pierce through the trees, a new day is framed in an entirely fresh way -- all of it combining into a different kind of mastery.