The north end of the Salish Sea

After passing more scenery like this on the ferry ride to Saltery Bay, we drove north to Powell River.  This is the north end of the Salish Sea, which used to be called Georgia Strait. Up here the mountains have glaciers and there are long fiord-like inlets that pierce the coast.

Powell River is an interesting little city that appears to be having a big resurgence.  It had its beginning in 1908 when a pulp mill was built there and the town was built around that with houses for workers and executives clustering around the mill. According to Wikipedia, at one time the Powell River Mill was the largest pulp and paper mill in the world. One in every 25 newspapers world-wide was printed on paper from Powell River. Since then there've been a lot of layoffs and the town languished n the 1970s and 80s.  I lived for a time on Texada Island, across from Powell River, in the late 1970s and there were a lot of lovely old houses sitting empty at that time.

But now the town is thriving and there are lots of young people wanting a simpler lifestyle. The old houses in the Townsite area around the mill have all been bought up and new houses are being built. Tourism, the arts, and ecological enterprises now flourish there along with the more traditional coastal jobs. It's also a place that's attracting retirees and recreational homes.

We drove further north to Lund, which is the end of the paved road. Lund is really just a dock and some wharves. Lots of people go through there to take the water taxi to Savary Island or to head up by boat to Desolation sound. Funny thing though, Lund and the waters north of there are some of the warmest in British Columbia.  The weather is pretty warm too; warm enough that these palm trees outside Nancy's Bakery are flourishing.

Here's a little boardwalk at Lund that goes around the bay to a little restaurant, closed now but obviously well attended in the summertime.

Mostly we saw shore birds at Lund, clustering around the tidal edges of the harbour. These are surf scoters, a bird that I haven't seen in Victoria.  There were lots of them there, as well as geese, seagulls, ducks, and crows. And in the bakery was a bulletin board posting all of the counter-culture notices and ads for services and events taking place in the community. I love looking at these for a window into the lives lived there.

We ended our trip by taking the afternoon ferry across from Powell River to Comox on the east side of Vancouver Island, where we visited our friends who live there.  That fourth ferry ride completed our circle tour of the Salish Sea.  (Victoria to  Vancouver,  Horseshoe Bay to The Sunshine Coast,  Earls Cover to Saltery Bay, Powell River to Comox). Then we headed south to our home in Victoria.  It was a pleasant trip.

The Sunshine Coast

We've spent the last three days on what they call the Sunshine Coast, a collection of villages scattered along the BC coast north of Vancouver. You can only get get there by ferry so people sometimes assume it's an island, but it's not. We took the ferry on Sunday morning in a rainstorm and arrived at Gibson's Landing, where the famous CBC television show, The Beachcombers, was filmed for many years.

This building was originally used as part of the set for the show. Now it's a restaurant and is visited by tour buses in the summer.  We were there with our friend Sue who is housesitting in Roberts Creek, where she used to live, so we got the insiders tour of the area.







You'll see that there's a bit of blue sky in this photo, but at this time of year there's not a lot of sunshine. Apparently it's quite different in the summertime, when the beaches are full of holidaying families.

We took a walk along this beach, where there's a road lined with little old beach cabins, some of which are now transformed into larger permanent homes. It looks like a lovely place to either holiday or live. These places have a strong sense of community and it was nice to get of sense of this from Sue, who lived in one of them for more than 30 years.


This photo is taken in Porpoise Bay, a protected anchorage in behind Sechelt. You can see the stunning scenery with the inlet and the mountains and the clouds.












And of course the boats. There are boats of all kinds here. Every community is built around a harbour, with a government wharf where boats are moored. In fact this part of the coast was settled by steamships and fishing boats and settlers long before the road came through.

This is a ramp coming down from one of the government wharves. Even a little rowing skiff can find a place to tie up.


Yesterday morning we headed north to Earl's Cove at the end of the peninsula, where we took a ferry further up the coast to Powell River.  On the way we stopped in at Egmont, a tiny spot near the Skookumchuck narrows.  It's a very isolated and beautiful spot, which we would like to come back and explore some time. But not in March. I think the feeling of this area would be much more welcoming in the summer time


Here's a bit of the scenery we passed on our way to Egmont. It's very moist and dark with still lakes, sheltered inlets and steep steep mountains all around.

And here's the view from the ferry as it left Earl's Cove and headed around a large island at the mouth of Jervis Inlet. This really is the north coast of BC.

Vancouver's Chinatown

Took a walk around Vancouver's Chinatown on the weekend while visiting family in Vancouver.

Had dinner here. I highly recommend it.

These old tenement buildings bring to mind the Vancouver that I grew up in.



This is the old Vancouver Sun building, once a treasured sight on Vancouver's skyline.

These last two are taken in the lovely Sun Yat Sen Gardens.

Spring has arrived on Yukon Street

Today we sat outside in the sun on the back deck--without jackets. Hooray! I think spring has arrived. We can't complain because we missed most of the rain and wind while we were in Mexico. But what a joy to sit outside and feel warm. Our thermometer registered 24 degrees C. It may have been in the sun a bit--but who cares. It felt like 24 degrees for a short while.

This is what happened to the trees in the park across the street over the weekend. They blossomed.

Happy Spring.