7 July 2012

Today we left Port Angeles and went to three sites in Olympic National Park.  The first location was Hurricane Ridge, which overlooks the Olympic mountains and is at an elevation about a mile above sea level.  There is still snow on several of the longer hiking trails, so we didn’t hike as much as we wanted at this location.  Once again we found blue lupine in bloom.

Our second stop was at Sol Duc, which is classified as coastal forest.  Most of the trails were along the various campgrounds, and there wasn’t a lot of parking.  We walked to see the Sol Duc salmon cascade.  We didn't see any salmon jumping.

We then walked up to Sol Duc falls.  There's no way salmon could jump up this falls.  So it begged the question, where do they spawn?

Our third stop was at Hoh River valley, which is classified as coastal rain forest.  Fortunately it wasn’t raining!  In the Hoh area you can see giant Sitka redwoods and hemlock trees.  The largest cedar tree was over 270 feet tall, 20 feet across, and between 500 to 550 years old. 

 We strolled/hiked about 5.5miles.  Nothing too taxing and we eventually drove on to Hoquiam Washington.  The campground is relatively new, definitely full, and we were lucky with our late arrival the campsite is on the tranquil Hoquiam River.

6 July 2012

Left West Bay Marina in search of a downtown parking space large enough to fit the RV.  Fortunately we were early enough in the morning that we found a lot and scored two spaces.  Once we abandoned the RV, we walked around downtown Victoria.   Outside of the Royal BC Museum is a recently renovated totem park.  There were about a dozen poles, plus there were some house poles in the windows of the museum.  It is fascinating to read the stories each pole tells, and how the raven, orca, eagle and people figures have a different role depending upon the First Nation society. 

We did some street strolling, meandering in and out of various tourist stores.  I found a birthday present for Aaron, but nothing else.  We had lunch and on the way back to get the RV for our ferry trip, there was a street performer doing magic down in the wharf area.  Unfortunately we only caught the last 5 minutes of his act.  What we saw was good, particularly his crowd banter.  He made a funny crack about children not doing this at home.

Waiting is skill that must be learned and mastered.  Regrettably Roger and I aren’t very good at it.  We had to be at the ferry by 1:30 to wait for our customs inspection.  The ferry didn’t leave until 3.  Once the inspection was over, we then had to wait to move the RV aboard and then get permission to leave the RV.  Hurry up and wait.   The ferry was fine until we got into the San Juan channel open water, then it did a slow roll back and forth.  There were a few people green around the gills.  Port Angeles is a small town and we’re at the KOA for the night, because it was convenient to Olympic National Park.  Tomorrow if the weather holds we plan on going into the park and doing some hiking.  The below picture is what we can see from our campsite, still some snow on the ridge.

5 July 2012

Onward to Victoria.  We left Branbury (Vancouver “suburb”) to go to Tsawwassen (in greater Vancouver) for the 10:00 BC Ferry over to Vancouver Island through the Gulf Islands waterway.  Roger and I were both amazed at how efficient loading and unloading went.  We drove on to the main deck, with cars also being loaded above via a sky ramp.  It took 90 minutes to make the transit from Tsawwassen to Swartz Bay.

 

On the ferry, we sat across from a very spry 83 y/o lady, Sophia.  Sophia’s husband died 8 years ago and so she now lives in Victoria.  She always wanted to retire to Victoria, but her husband didn’t want to so since his retirement they had lived in Ottawa.  Sophia was on her return trip from Newfoundland, where she was visiting older family members.  She left Newfoundland when she joined the Navy.  She had to quit the Navy when she got married, because back then it wasn’t allowed.  Her husband was career Air Force.  Anyway earlier this year she had bypass surgery and now is the proud owner of a cow valve that replaced her worn out heart valve.  Sophia told us that this replacement was pioneered in the USA.  I asked her if she now likes to take her coffee with cream and she laughed.  Sophia flew to Newfoundland and was finishing a land cross country trek, by herself, across Canada which was something she always wanted to do.  So her trip was definitely a planes, trains, bus and car adventure.  She told us that she had a wonderful time and adventure.  She told her children that they would only her from her if there was a problem.  This she said was rather liberating, because it meant she wasn’t tethered to a cellphone or computer.  Sophia was a lovely lady to chat with.

When we arrived on Vancouver Island we headed to Butchart Gardens.  We spent about 2 hours with over 10 busloads of our closest oriental friends.  Herding our way through the various walkways, dodging people who would stop with no warning to take a picture, it was pretty, stressful, and not terribly relaxing despite all the wonderful spring flowers that were in bloom.  Some cultures do not share our concept of personal space.  Butchart Gardens has seven unique areas:  the Sunken Garden which was built in the old quarry, a Rose Garden that had a heady fragrance despite every rose I smelled not having any smell, a Japanese Garden, a Star Pond area, an Italian Garden with piazza, and Mediterranean Garden.  Roger and I enjoyed the flowers, but not the throngs of people.  We got spoiled with all the gardens we visited in England and New Zealand that weren’t crowded with busloads of people.  I’ve picked a few of the choice flower pictures to share with you.

Afterwards we drove on to West Bay Marine RV park.  We found out today that 1 July officially starts the summer holiday period for Canadians.  This means that on the weekends RV parks are always full, especially at the highly desirable tourist destinations such as Victoria.  We got lucky and got the second to last spot at the RV park.  Tomorrow there aren’t any empty spaces, so we’ll be leaving to go to Port Angeles, Washington.  We set up camp and unloaded our bicycles.  We rode into Victoria and were both glad we had parked the RV.  Victoria was crowded, but is a very bicycle friendly place.  Lots of folks were out riding, both as a means of transportation and also as a form of exercise.  We rode to the US ferry company location to figure out how to take the ferry back to the USA.  Then we rode down Government to see the provincial parliament buildings and the marina. 

 The last two pictures are of floating houses on the marina, which the campground is adjacent to.  Prices start at $150K and go to over $750K.  You also only sign a long term lease on the waterfront "property", in other words you own the house but not the water underneath it.

We did some information asking about things to do tomorrow, as we don’t have to be at the ferry dock until 1:30 pm to clear US customs for a 3:00 pm departure. 

4 July 2012

Happy Independence Day!

No rain today!  As I write this, I can’t see a cloud in the sky.  It’s 68 degrees and sunny, hip-hip hooray!

We spent our 4^th walking around Vancouver.  First off, Vancouver is a very commuter friendly city.    At the campground we bought day transit passes, which allows use of the metro and all buses for $9/day after rush hour.  We walked about 10 minutes from the campground to the metro and then rode downtown to the waterfront.  From there we went to Gastown, which is one of the earliest parts of downtown.  There’s a famous steam powered clock that we had to see and you can see I was having my morning Starbuck’s in honor of Lynda as well.  I stopped in a jewelry store that had ammolite.  Not knowing anything about ammolite, and the saleslady not being busy, I got instructed on this stone.   Basically, it’s the Canadian version of opal.  It’s a soft stone that’s found in big rocks like opal and is mined solely in Canada.  It has a rainbow color sort of like an opaque tourmaline, and is a soft stone.  Needless to say because it is a soft stone I didn’t buy any.  However I did get a picture of the second largest ammolite stone ever found in Canada.  The saleslady said the stone is priceless and was not for sale.

Next we walked over to Chinatown.  Vancouver has the second largest Chinese population in North America, only behind San Francisco.  The Chinese gate was dedicated in 2002 with sponsorship by the local Chinese Canadian community.  From there we walked to Dr. Sun Yat Sin’s Chinese Garden.  We went into the free section of the garden.  We didn’t feel the need for tea in the pay section, and the claim to fame is that all the parts used in construction were imported from China.  (Of course this left me wondering what the big deal is with Chinese imports, have they been to Walmart lately?)

Then we headed to W. Pender St to catch a bus to Stanley Park, which is a very large park on the tip of continental Vancouver and from where you can see North Vancouver and Lion’s Gate Bridge which connects the two.  The park is really nice.  It is a lot like Golden Gate Park or Balboa Park.  There are pedestrian walkways that run parallel with bicycle and rollerblade paths.  We walked a lot.  Starting at the crew boat house and ending at the outbound bus pickup.  About a third of the way around, there is a very interesting totem pole park, where all the various Pacific First Nation People have a totem pole with their interpretation of the various deities that their heritage had/has beliefs in.  After that we walked the seawall and along the way we had to stop for ice cream, because Roger was so famished that he desperately needed nourishment (?).

We rode the bus back to Gastown and had an unremarkable late lunch at Steamworks Pub.  Since the food was so-so, we opted not to get dessert there.  Instead we found a unique place to indulge our vices.  Roger got ice cream.  I got chocolate.  Afterwards we headed back to the campground.  We’re now relaxing.  Roger has a recycled copy of a newspaper we picked up on the metro, and I’m occupied writing my entry.  All in all, a great day.

3 July 2012

We left our quaintly decorated campsite for the palatial digs of the big city, Vancouver.  But I’m getting ahead of myself.  The drive south and west started off through undulating pasture land surrounded by old established glacial mountains, that eventually transitioned to the Northern Canadian Rockies.  This means that there were rounded tops with timber growth, so besides seeing livestock, we also had to be on the lookout for timber trucks.  Timber trucks consist of a semi cab with 3 log bearing trailers stacked to maximum height and fullness. 

We transitioned from moose and caribou country into bear and deer country.  Interesting that the bears continue to follow us south, and that Canada 99 has to post in several places “Do not stop to feed or view bears.”   Canada 99 closely follows the Fraiser River for over 100 miles.  This was tantamount to a slow and extremely long roller coaster ride, in the rain of course.  Hair pin curves were countless and the twisting curve signs were also numerous.  When we left the Fraiser River, we followed Cayoosh Creek for over 100 km too.  Along the way, we stopped at Fort Berens winery and tasted some Gold Medal winning wines.  I ended up buying a few bottles.  Roger is worried about going through US Customs, but I’m not because I didn’t buy that much.

The picture below is Duffey Lake, which is formed by a huge log jam that occurred years ago, and is now maintained by the annual flow of logs that fall and get moved downstream.  The Native term for the log jam is teq.

We stopped at Whistler hoping to get a nice walk in, while looking around the base of the slope in the summertime.  They locale is working hard to make Whistler a year round place.  From extreme sports activities, which included a skate board park, a bike BMX course, lots of mountain bike trails, to putt putt golf and bungee trapeze.  All with the goal to make money in the summertime. 

We then took off up one of the ski trails and about a mile out it started to rain.  So we turned around and got wet on the return trek.  On the way back to the RV, we came across the Squamish  Native Interpretative Center.  Out front a guy was just getting started on carving a totem pole. 

Our campsite for the evening is “swanky.”  It has individual hedges between each site pad.  Of course this comes with a location price.  But we are walking distance to the Vancouver metro and don’t have to move the RV and find a place to park in downtown Vancouver.  Tomorrow we’re headed downtown, I think, and then on Thursday we’ll be taking the ferry over to Victoria on Vancouver Island.

2 July

On the road again, it was a grey dreary day driving in and out of light showers all the way south on Canada 97.  We were going to stop and do some walking around in the Lake District, but about 5 minutes before we got to the campground, it decided to pour.  So we decided to skip stopping for the afternoon and continued south.  We ended up stopping in Williams Lake.  We're staying at an interesting campground.  The decor is definitely different as you can see from the pictures around our RV.

Canada 97 is the Cariboo Hwy.  The Cariboo region is rolling hills with lots of pasture land with forest farms inbetween.  Livestock include horses, cattle, alpacas and sheep.  Regrettably we finally saw a moose on the side of the road.  Roadkill so no picture.  It looked to be a young moose, too early to have antlers as they loose them in the spring.  We'll keep looking for moose and hopefully we'll see one worth taking a picture.

Tomorrow we're headed to Whistler's Mountain area.  It's supposed to have good hiking, that is if it doesn't rain.  The weather report is for more rain.  The CBC news reported that it's been wet and really cooler than normal, which has delayed the blueberry season and stretched the raspberry season.  However some of the tailend of the raspberry corp are rotting off because of too much rain.

Not a very eventful day.

1 July
Happy Canada Day!

Last night the rain brought us a series of rainbows.  In fact there was a partial double rainbow, but alas our faithful pocket camera just couldn't capture it.

Today of course it was raining, again.  So we left Teslin and took Canada 37 south on the scenic Cassiar Highway, the whole 724 km.  The drive promised to be eventful, as we saw this guy the first half an hour.

Then about 15 minutes later we saw this group.

And then finally this guy answered the age old question about a bear doing it in the woods.

All in all we saw 8 live black bears and one roadside casualty.  At least we don't think it was just sleeping on the side of the road.  This made for an exciting first hours, but the remaining hours were only greeted by seeing more swollen rivers, lakes and ponds.  We were on the lookout for the illusive moose, as we saw several moose warning signs, but no such luck.  We also saw several Mushroom Buying tents in the first hours.  When we stopped to stretch, we asked about this and the lady said that people go out into the woods to pick mushrooms on weekends.  Apparently they get paid good money for the mushrooms.  Generally areas that are recovering from forest fires make the best foraging areas, starting one year after the fire up until the vegetation starts to green up again.  When we asked what kind of mushrooms, the lady said the kind you eat, and couldn't provide any more information on the variety.

Tonight we stopped in Kitwanga BC, which is at the end of the Cassiar Highway.  Our Milepost says that there's a salmon inventory station here, but the guy in the campground office said that you can't see anything, because the river is too dirty from all the extra runoff.  Feast or famine.

Tomorrow the game plan is to take a casual drive to Prince George BC.  Roger is researching how we get to Vancouver Island, as some Canadians we chatted with last night said that the western side of the island is spectacular.  They were from Calgary.

Add another warning sign to the list:

Livestock  (I think there are some free range highland cattle along the Cassiar Highway, but you can't prove this by us.  This is based on a sign I saw.)