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| Vancouver Island, Mountains and Glacier |
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| Kelowna Vineyard on Lake Okanagen |
From
Jasper, Alberta, we headed west and south to Kelowna in the Okanagan Valley,
British Columbia (BC). The Okanagan
Valley extends a couple hundred miles from south of the US border north from
the Okanagan Valley in Washington to Kamloops, BC. In the Okanagan Valley, there are numerous
vineyards with a lot of small wineries to enjoy.
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| Bob and Linda with Darcy and Julie Deltor |
We
joined our friends from Costa Rica, Julie and Darcy Deltor, for an enjoyable
sail from the West Kelowna Yacht Club on Okanagan Lake, a long, narrow and deep
glacial lake. They have a beautiful 33
foot Alerion Express sloop, which is perfect for single-handed lake sailing;
there was not even a need for lifelines on the boat! Most enjoyably, we were able to wear shorts
and tee shirts for the first time in months and really enjoyed the sun and
warmth and a delicious lunch on the boat.
After
a wonderful day with them, we spent several additional days sampling the wines and
enjoying the Okanagan Valley; the micro-climates favor sweeter wines, not our
favorites, but we found some very good dry Rieslings, Chenin Blancs and unoaked
Chardonnays that we liked well enough to purchase. We kept our purchases to a minimum since we
would soon be heading back to the US and we could only bring in 2 bottles of
alcohol each.
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| Bob on his 72nd, Red Door Bistro....Yummy |
We
stopped briefly for a two-night visit and used a timeshare apartment in
Whistler BC, north of Vancouver, a place we had always heard about, but had
never managed to ski. Whistler meant
back into the mountains, and to a couple of cold, rainy days, made more
difficult because we had just left such nice weather. We just put on our warm clothes and raingear
and enjoyed the numerous unique shops and excellent restaurants. We celebrated Bob’s 72nd birthday
at the Red Door Bistro, a top French restaurant; Linda enjoyed foie gras and then
bouillabaisse and Bob went for the veal steak.
Since our reservations were only a few days in advance, we couldn’t get
a table, but elected to sit at the kitchen counter and had a great time
enjoying watching and conversing with the chefs. And as a close friend of ours always says,
“it was the best”!
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| Downtown Vancouver from Stanley Park |
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| The Public Market, Granville Island, Vancouver |
We
left Whistler, and headed south to Vancouver.
It is a nice city, but very crowded with lots of traffic. We enjoyed Stanley Park, one of the largest
urban parks in North America, and most especially, Grandville Island, an
industrial island recast into an arts and food/wine center. We loved the Public Market, where we sampled fresh
and unusual foods. We purchased one of our
favorites, the “best scallops in the world” from Digby, Nova Scotia. No kidding, they were advertised by the seafood vendor that way and we agree, based on our experience last year in Nova Scotia; too bad we can't get them in the US.
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| Capilano Suspension Bridge, Vancouver |
The places we enjoyed most
outside the City Center were Grouse Mountain, which overlooks Vancouver, and
the Capilano Park and Suspension Bridge, which is billed as the longest
suspension bridge in North America and has been used in several movies.
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| Tofino in early am FOG |
From
Vancouver City, we took the ferry over to Vancouver Island – a really nice 1.5
hour “cruise”. It took us over 4 hours
to drive cross the island to the Pacific Rim National Park on the only road
that goes to the west coast of Vancouver Island. The island is very rugged,
with very high mountains and even a few glaciers. The west coast is very rugged with dense
temperate rainforests marching down the slopes directly to the water, with an
occasional beach strewn with huge logs, many downed from ancient stands of huge
trees. The water is VERY cold, and with
the warmish weather, morning fog and drizzles was the normal weather for the
summer; the fog would finally burn off about 1-2 pm. The Island geology is far
too complex for Bob’s explanation and description, (thankfully, you might say).
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| Linda INSIDE Ancient Tree |
During
our three weeks on the Island’s west and east coasts, we explored the ancient
tree stands, including Cathedral Grove (the oldest tree was already large and
300 years old when Columbus landed in America), wherever they survived the
logging industry. We explored the two
small towns to the north and south of Pacific Rim National Park, Tofino and
Ucluelet. We hiked portions of the Wild
Pacific Trail which extends along much of the rugged western coast of
Vancouver; the scenery was breathtaking.
With 14 – 15 foot tides, we were also able to enjoy exploring tide pools
on the rocks at low tides…along with all the other “kids”.
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| Starfish in Tidal Pool |
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| Wild Pacific Trail, Ucluelet, Vancouver Island |
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| Humpback on tail in shallow water, looking around |
Whale
watching was great, although Linda saw Grey and Humpback whales, we saw no
orcas. Instead of the whale watching boat
trip, Bob went salmon fishing (catching this time J) and brought home enough coho and chinook
to fill our freezer (usually our fishing trips are not so productive). We spent one beautiful day (no fog for a
change) to take all day round trip boat ride down a very long and deep inlet
(in Norway it would qualify as a long “Fiord”) from
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| Bob with 2 of 4 salmon |
Bob with 2 of 4 sPort Alberni in the central
part of the Island through the Broken Islands Chain to Ucluelet on the coast. The city of Port Alberni was heavily damaged in
1964 by three tsunami waves caused by the great Anchorage earthquake that also destroyed
much of the Anchorage waterfront (we saw the remaining damage when visiting
Anchorage a few years ago). The tsunami
wave height was amplified as it moved further up the narrowing inlet into
shallower water.
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| Chamainus, City of Murals, One of 200+ |
Almost
all of the entire population of Vancouver Island lives on the east coast of the
island and in the City of Victoria. We
explored lots of small coastal towns. As
the logging industry diminished, the towns needed to find ways to survive, and
many chose tourism. For example, Duncan
is the “City of Totem Poles” and Chemainus is the “City of Murals”, and the
plans seem to be working.
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| Sunken Garden, Butchart |
Victoria
is a beautiful “city”, really a large town, and the Provincial capital of BC.
Our favorite places included the Empress
Hotel and the Provincial Legislature building. The BC museum was fabulous.
The inner harbor is a great walking venue, and
the beautiful gardens are everywhere.
They
say there is not much snow either, but that is a relative statement on our judgement.
The
world famous Butchart Gardens were a wonder, especially the old quarry, now a
fabulous sunken garden; it is a must see.
We attended Sunday service and coffee at Victoria’s St Andrews
Presbyterian Church. Like our own church
in St Augustine, this beautiful church building was constructed 125 years ago.
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| Provincial Legislature Building, Victoria |
We
toured the Provincial Legislature and we finally understand the Canadian dual
governance arrangements, which encompass the Monarchy as a state in the British
Commonwealth, alongside the elected political system. Queen Elizabeth is the Queen of Canada, as
well as 16 other countries. The Governor
General is the Queen’s representative in Ottawa for Canada, and each province
has a Lieutenant Governor who is the Queen’s representative for that province;
all are appointed by the Queen. The
elected officials are voted for democratically.
Interestingly, Prime Minister Trudeau is now trying to change the way
election votes are cast and counted to determine who won. Under the proposed system, his labor party
would have won 10% more seats in the last election that they won.
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| Sunrise on Pacific Rim National Park Beach |
As
in Banff and Jasper in Alberta, we enjoyed several Royal Canadian Legion posts
in a few BC towns we visited. On Vancouver Island, Bob went on a Legion Shirt
hunt, and we stopped at several (Linda would say too many) Legions to find a shirt that he liked and in his
size. Finally, success, and we now have
an extensive collection of Canadian Legion pins and ribbons – and a hat and a
shirt. J
We
are now headed back to the US.
Communications in Canada has been very difficult. Since we mostly camped in National or
Provincial Parks without any services, we did not have any phone or internet
service in our motorhome. We had to head
off to the nearest town and use our phones as a hotspot, or find an internet
café. Vancouver Island was
impossible. For some reason, our phones would
not connect with the local cell phone provider and we had to find internet
cafes (we had too much coffee). It is
great to be back in the US; phones, text, email and even satellite TV in our
coach. We were not able to watch the Olympics very
much and the little bit of the first few days we saw was mostly about the
Canadians. It appeared to us that the
CBC did a great job in covering the games and especially covering the top
athletes, so we saw some of the top US swimmers, gymnasts, and track athletes.
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| Vancouver Island West Coast Beach |
Having
now spent over 2 months in Alberta and British Columbia, we have revised our
perspective on Canadians. We had always
thought of them as being very much like Americans. But that is not entirely true. Although we share a similar language and
similar historical backgrounds; there are a lot of difference in the ways we
look at things. For example; Western
Canadian residents are concerned about their “immigration problem”. They have been overwhelmed by an influx of LEGAL
Asians, who are taking their jobs and buying BC real estate at inflated prices. Interestingly, in a special legislature session
in August, BC just passed a 35% tax on all real estate transactions by
non-Canadian citizens. The revenue will be used to fund low cost housing. It is very difficult for younger people to
buy a home in Vancouver and Victoria.
Unlike our immigration issues, Canada’s “immigration problem” is from
highly educated, workaholic immigrants doing better than they are in school and
in the workplace.
Bottom
line, Canadians (even many “conservative” Legion members we met) appear to be
much more secular and liberal in their thinking and social values than the “average
American”. In Victoria, we were told by
a minister that less than 3% of the residents go to Church. They are more open to government intervention
and higher taxes. We paid over $5 per
gallon of gas versus our $2.50 in the US (diesel is cheaper than gas), and that
was in oil resource rich Alberta.
We
are now headed back to the US: North Cascade National Park and then over to the
San Juan Islands before heading to Mt Rainier, Seattle and the Olympic
peninsula.
We
are having a great trip and we thank God for his blessings and our safety as we
continue our travels.
Bob and Linda
