Visitor in the night

11:30 pm and the noises outside seemed to indicate that the downstairs tenant had arrived home. It was strange that the noises seemed to be coming from the garage. I poked my head out the front door to see a shadow near the garage and in front of our car. I wondered what he was doing. It was then that my heart skipped a beat as the shadow moved and I realised that it was a bear. It moved away from the car and across the front lawn. I called to Paula and Bridget that there was a bear going across the yard. We looked out the bedroom window to see a shadow crash through the hedge and into next door's yard. We grabbed some torches and carefully walked down the driveway. I could see it's dark shape walking down the road. It would have been about waist height, or a meter tall, while walking on all fours. It disappeared in between some cars. We heard someone's bin get knocked over and it again appeared on the road. It continued on it's way searching for garbage. When I got back to look around the garage, I saw that our wheelie bin had been knocked over. Lucky that we didn't have any garbage in it.
Yet another reminder of the environment we are living in.

Skagit Valley Tulip Festival

Capilano Suspension Bridge

On of the other Australian teachers here in Vancouver had friends coming to visit. They were coming from Melbourne to visit a sick uncle in Toronto and calling in to Vancouver on their way home. As it happened, they visited with him and stayed a couple of weeks. They helped put his affairs in order and said their goodbyes. When they arrived in Vancouver they were told that he had passed away. They then arranged for him to be cremated and were going to take his ashes back to Australia. He had lived in Canada for about 50 years, but had no relations here.
We made arrangements to meet them at the Capilano Suspension Bridge. As well as our free VIP passes, we had some free passes, and could also get discounts for any extra "guests". This was another one of the places that the kids remembered from 2001. There had been some additions since then. The Treetop Walk and the Cliffhanger Walk were both new.
After that we went back to our place for a drink, before Paula and Kerrie took them up Grouse Mountain to get a view of the city by night. When they got back we had a nice salmon dinner and a few drinks before they headed back to Port Coquitlam.
A couple of days later Paula went in the Sea Bus to meet them in town and spend the day sightseeing before they left to go back to Australia.

Easter and daffodils

We got a 4 day weekend for Easter. In the US they don't get any extra days, but in Canada schools got Good Friday and Easter Monday. We decided to go and catch up with friends in Washington State, and to visit the school that we were at in 2001. We rang on Thursday afternoon to check that it would be OK to visit on Friday afternoon. Laurie, the school secretary, checked the calendar and decided that it would be fine.
We slept in a little and left mid-morning. I was allowing 1 -2 hours for the border crossing. We headed for the border and got to the crossing at Aldergrove to find that the cars were backed up to 14th Street, so we turned around and headed for the Huntingdon crossing near Abbotsford. As we took the exit of the freeway I could see the line of cars. We sat in the line-up for 4.5 hours.
When we finally got to the booth at the border the guard commented that, "The Canadians haven't done us any favours here." We wondered what he was on about. He said that when they had stapled the Immigration paperwork into the passports, they had stapled through the machine readable part of the US visa. This was like cancelling a cheque. Luckily after removing the staples and flattening the page it was able to be fed through the machine.
It was close to 5 hours since we had first arrived at the border. We knew that we were not going to make it to Allen, so we headed for Chuckanut Drive, and the shellfish farm where we bought 5 dozen oysters and some smoked salmon. We stayed with friends for the weekend.
On Saturday we got organised for a traditional Easter Egg hunt. We must have had about 100 plastic eggs that we filled with candy and money. It was then up to the adults to hide these eggs outside. They have a pretty big yard and Paula, Patty, Roger and I tried to hide the eggs in not too obvious, or difficult spots. It was then the kids turn. They came out, each armed with a bag of some description to carry their spoils. They quickly spread out and proceeded to find eggs all over the yard. They each ended up with about the same number of eggs. Daniel managed to, as well as choclolate and candy, get about $10 in coins. Bridget got about $4.
After the hunt we went for a drive to check out the daffodils. Everything is late this year because of the colder than usual, and later winter. The Tulip Festival is supposed to be on during April, but they were quite a few weeks away.
We decided to catch up with Linda, who was the principal of the school that I taught at in 2001. Sh elives out on Samish Island. She has a nice view out across the bay to Chuckanut Drive, and on a clear night can see the lights of Vancouver's three North Shore ski mountains. We stayed for a couple of hours chatting and got contact details for a couple of other people that we want to see.
This was parked in a carpark near a main intersection in town. It had lights flashing and stickers covering almost every square cm of it's body. The guys in the van were selling the stickers. Good advertising and a great way to see parts of the country.

Grouse Mountain

The three ski areas in North Vancouver - Mt Seymour, Cypress Mountain and Grouse Mountain apparently all agreed weeks ago that they would finish the ski season on April 15th. Since that decision there has been further snow falls, leading to a snow pack on Grouse Mountain of nearly five meters.

When we got back to Vancouver after the Spring Break, Paula and Kerrie went up Grouse, Kerrie decided to take a Snow-limousine tour of the mountain and
talked Paula into going with her.

The kids then did the snow-limo tour the next weekend as an introduction to skis and to the runs on Grouse Mountain. They did a 30 minute tour which cost C$50 each. The guys that took the kids took them on an extra run because they had gone down the runs faster than anyone they had taken in the previous 3 weeks. They said it was great fun.

Gibson's Landing to North Van

We stayed at "Camp Too", at Soame's Point with Betty, Bruce and Patty. Betty lives right on the beach with a view across the water to the Sea to Sky Highway and Cypress Mountain. Looking to the left about a kilometer away was the Langdale ferry terminal. It is a beautiful place to live. A couple of kilometers away is Gibson's Landing, the setting of the TV series - "The Beachcombers".
It was drizzling rain on and off, so we headed into Gibson's to have a look around. We all took off in different directions to explore the town. Some headed to the shops, while I headed for the the harbour area. I can imagine that this would be a hive of activity in the summer. There are harbourside restaurants and oyster bars that are pretty quiet at the moment, and a great little sheltered harbour.
After lunch we decided to brave the weather and take a hike to the top of Soame's Hill. Bruce, Patty, Bridget, Daniel and I got into our wet weather gear and headed for the hill. The start of the track was in rainforest with spruce, birch, fir and cedar trees. As we climbed the ferns became fewer, and the top was more exposed and rocky. On the way up the breeze picked up and we were hit by a hail storm. Bruce suggested that a hail storm usually comes at the end of a storm and is followed by clear weather. As we got to the top the blue sky was appearing and we got some reasonable views down the coast and across to Vancouver Island.
Paula and Kerrie had a great time chatting with Betty, who is 84, and was brought up in Churchill, Manitoba. That is on the shores of Hudson Bay and in polar bear country. Her father had been a fur trapper. She had some great stories to tell, and photos and relics to show. She also invited us to come back and stay, and suggested that the kids could even go there by themselves if they wished. All they would have to do is catch a bus to Horseshoe Bay, jump on a ferry, and then walk from the ferry terminal along the beach to her house. Maybe they will take her up on the offer in the summer. We needed to head off so we caught a late afternoon ferry back to Horseshoe Bay to complete an interesting, albeit quick circular trip around Vancouver Island and the Sunshine Coast. At least we know some places that we would like to get back to again when we have more time.

Campbell River to Gibson's Landing

We left the house on Quadra at about 10 am to catch the ferry to Campbell River which is on the 50th parallel. We stopped near the port to have a look around and also to get some lunch. When I was walking around the wharf I spotted a large troller that had been mentioned in an article that I had read in the local paper. Apparently about a week earlier the captain of a tug boat had been lost overboard while they were on their way back into port. The story of his rescue by the Pacific Faith is here. I also saw something like a mink running along the wharf.

We had a couple of hours until the next ferry from Comox to Powell River so we took it easy and drove down the coast road. On the way we went through Ocean Grove and also saw the Lorne Hotel. The names remind me of home. After a quick drive through Comox we headed towards the ferry departure area. We had a wait of about an hour, and then a crossing of around 1.5 hours to the mainland to Powell River. The crossing was a little bumpy, but not too bad.

We arrived at Powell River a bit later than expected and had to rush down the coast to make the next ferry connection from Saltery Bay to Earl's Cove. This part of the BC coast is only accessible via the ferries. There is no access across the mountains. We had arranged to have dinner with Bruce and Patty, at Bruce's mum's house in Gibson's Landing, and if we missed the next ferry we wouldn't be there till very late. We ended up making the connection with about 10 minutes to spare, but didn't see much of Powell River.