Starfish, they’re all over the shores in Chemaninus
Hi everyone! On July 7th. we left Port Angeles, Washington on the ferry and headed over to Victoria, BC. Our first trip on a ferry and while the ride was uneventful, the weather sucked. Cold, damp and rainy...temp in the low teens (centigrade) but it felt even more miserable after a month and half of hot sunny days, none below 30 C! Welcome back to the great white north aye!? :-)
Luckily that little cold snap only lasted a couple of days and since then it’s been beautiful, sunny with temps in the day usually in the low to mid 20s. Great for getting out hiking and biking of which we’ve been doing lots of. So many trails, so little time.
First week we parked the trailer at an RV park in the Malahat. It’s in between Victoria where Jac (niece) and Pat (Dave’s sister) live but we stayed with Pat most of the time and only ended up actually sleeping at the trailer once. Since we decided to stay another week, we moved the trailer to Pat’s driveway...cheap accommodations and easier to get at all our stuff!
Chemainus is a really pretty little seaside town, about an hour north of Victoria and it’s known for it it’s murals. They’re everywhere and they’re world renowned. Helped revive what was a dying logging town and now bus loads of tourists come to see the murals. Dave and I have been biking around quite a bit and exploring the shoreline whenever we can get down to it.
Couldn’t come to Vancouver Island without going whale watching. So many tour companies to choose from here but we ended up deciding on Orca Spirit. They had comfortable, enclosed boats....we decided against doing the zodiac boat tours, too bumpy, too cold and no where to pee on a 3-4 hr tour! And, even though there were only 29 of us on the tour, they put us on the Pacific Explorer, the boat they normally use for tours of 45-70 so we had tons of space to move and watch from. Perfect!
Went on a beautiful, hot day but once we got out on the water and started moving, COLD! Apparently the water is only 10C so we were advised to stay in the boat...not a problem! Once they found the orcas we got quite the show. We saw breaches (where they jump right out of the water), tail slaps and even a spy hop. They can see just as well above water as below so when they’re curious about something (ie. us) they move above water vertically...just like a periscope on a sub...that was so cool to see, we must have been worth checking out! Would have loved a picture of that but you need such good timing to get any decent shot at all. Lucked out and got a few good other ones though!
Also visited Cathedral Grove where the douglas firs and red cedars are huge! One is 800 years old, the other giant ones are only 300...all impressive!
Hiked around quite a bit with Jac, Kent and the girls (Maggie and Abby)...you’ll see them in the pics. Real cuties and one is quite the mountain goat for such a tiny little thing!
It’s also just nice to hang out and talk and drink with family, For those of you at home, Pat’s got a great set up here, nice house, yard, neighbours AND a new job! Yes a JOB! Dave and I are loving sending her off to work each morning...she’s not loving that quite so much though! :-)
Figure we’ll stay here until next Sunday or Monday then head over to Vancouver and start heading east.
Check out the ALBUM.