Sunday Sixteen...

Sixteen of my faaaaavourite moments from our trip to Vancouver Island. (Already a month ago...why do you have to pass so fast Summer?)

1. Wildflowers of BC.  Just beautiful. All the time. 

On the curb in Ucluelet.

In the forest in Tofino...

In a construction lot in Comox.

2. Accidentally finding a kilometre long hike completely on wooden boardwalks through massive old tree forest. Why wasn't this (totally free!) place advertised?? 

(It's called 'Schooner's Cove' if you're ever in Tofino.)

3. Whale watching. 

Almost everything I've been waiting for. 

Especially the big puffy orange suits.

Our Captain (who I think may have secretly been Mr. Highliner!)

Yes, we did see much more whale than this, but since I wasn't really focused on the camera, this is the best shot I got. We did get some great baby/momma synchronized feeding video though. That was pretty darn good.

Don on the high seas...

4. This tiny little seasonal aquarium. The volunteers who worked there were SO informative and always wanting to explain how things work in the ocean. They get everything from the ocean for the season, pump in sea water from right beside them and then return everything back in the fall. What a fun little treasure for a rainy day. Yes, fine, the starfish were my favourite.

5. Getting our rental car and finding out they gave us a hybrid without request or extra cost. It was lovely. We drove allllllllll week alllllllll over the island. Our final gas tab? $46.35 

6. Our first trip couch surfing. Just two of the awesome households we stayed in. Hmmm, they both even made us supper! What an incredible way to travel and meet the locals.

7. Beach combing. Don and I definitely found soul mates in each other in this specific way. We spent hours looking in the water, off docks, near harbours, spontaneously pulling off highways to walk the empty beaches and find treasures...

8. How to thrill Pam in four steps:

a. Take her for a walk along a harbour filled with huge starfish.

b. Give into her begging, and go in and get one for her. (Bonus points if you also sliced up your foot going barefoot on the barnacles...)

c. Give it to her to hold so she can watch in amazement as it slowly curls and 'stretches'.

d. Tell her you did it "just because you love her". 

(Cue communal 'awwww' along with step 'd.' .)

9. Visiting Hatley Castle (where they filmed a portion of  X-men, by the way...). Upon finding the castle was closed for a wedding (I know! Crazy huh?!), we meandered the grounds for a while and almost checked out the Japanese Gardens that the castle builder built for his wife in 1902. But then we found out it cost 10 bucks each and decided we don't love gardens that much. Well Don doesn't. I wistfully gazed through the gate for a moment when suddenly the security guard said, "Going In?" I inquired how much it was, even though I did already know...it must have been my Canadian Politeness coming out. He just shook his head and said, "Don't worry about it, have a walk around. Oh my. The deeper you went, the more beautiful and ornate it became. And we had it ALL to ourselves. What a good day.

The Castle...

The gardens...

10. Cathedral Grove. 

The oldest, biggest trees on the island. 

I love trees. 

This was like my tree mecca. 

ahhhh. 

11. The first few days we were on the island it was rainy and cold and while having a cute little hotel room was nice, we needed somewhere to go that would work with our budget. After a futile search we stumbled upon this lovely restaurant with: Great service, an incredible view, delicious food, completely decent prices and a very happy unsnobby atmosphere. It was so good we went back the next night when it started raining again.

12. Seeing the Pacific for the first time. I've been to BC quite a few times, but just never made it to the ocean. I have this thing about wanting to stick my feet in the water both east and west. It made me happy to finally meet that goal as we drove down a little backroad filled with huge hidden resorts and finally found a spot where we could jump out of the car, climb our way out to these rocks and stand and watch the huge ocean waves crash on the rocks, spraying us with cold, deliciously salty water.

13. Don joining an aboriginal drum circle...

Our whole reason to travel to the island was for Don to join the Port Alberni Frienship Centre for their Aboriginal Day Celebrations which included some live music (Don), a salmon bake, some traditional singing and some modern, local aborignal fashion in a very sweet small town fashion show.  After Don played, they invited the elders up to gather for their traditional drum circle and after a few song they invited Don up with his guitar to join the circle. He was very uncomfortable, because he didn't really know how to join in,  but I had a strange feeling of... pride watching him. And look mom and dad! I also tried the salmon even though I hate fish!

14. I don't know why all the goverment issued signs with wave and tsunami warnings intrigued me, but I always wanted to stop and read what they said! Could I be any more touristy?

15.Getting to one couch surfing host only to find they lived on a farm and were in the midst of raising some 4 week old border collies.

Oh, joy is happy cuddly little puppies!

16. Last, but probably the most exciting was Zip Lining outside of Nanaimo. Although you can't see it in the pictures very well, you'd strap into a harness and swing out at a reasonable speed out over a canyon hundreds of feet above the river with the old growth trees stretching not only way down below you to the canyon floor but also waaaaaaaay up over your head. What a thrill it was once I realized the break point between the two zip lines was on a platorm ON a gi-normus tree. Awe-some.

Above: The canyon-you can faintly see the two zip lines.

Below: A closer shot; if you look really closely, you can see a person zipping right about dead centre of the picture...

Below:The tree platform!

What an incredible trip! We'll stop there with the pictures...for now. But I'd say we'll definitely be headed back to 'the island' at some point in our lives.

Stay tuned for pictures from Yellowknife... probably in another month!