English Bay Beach

This guide to English Bay Beach in Vancouver follows Joe Fortes, who swam out into these waters on a June night in 1886 to rescue two strangers during a fire that swept through the young city. Born in Trinidad in 1863, he sailed around Cape Horn and settled on this sand, teaching the city's children to swim for free through the 1890s before Vancouver made him its first paid lifeguard around 1897. Picture him at dawn, a stocky man wading into the surf, blowing a whistle at reckless swimmers.