Endless hikes

Our Monday morning hikes have continued since mid October. The pictures below are from last week, at Englishman River Falls Provincial Park about 20km from Parksville 

                               I never tire of the rain forests

      How many seniors does it take to hold up a giant Douglas Fir?

       The sun made this a magical and serene place in the forest.

               Good view of the island mountains near Parksville

This week the hike included two trails, both right in Nanaimo city. There are over 3,200 acres of parkland and protected areas, 130km of trails and 63 playgrounds within the city.

It was showering, but we agreed to head out anyway. The first trail was called Beach Estates and made it's way down through a canyon to the Beach near the ferry terminal.

              There were hundreds of steps down and back up.

                                           Beautiful falls over smooth rock.

We came out at the beach just as the Vancouver ferry was docking.

Some of the trail was boardwalk and some was dirt and gravel mixed, good walking though. I did not take a picture of one of our seniors who slipped off the trail and went down about 15ft on his backside in the mud. He was not hurt badly, just very embarrassed, so we carried on.

We basically survived the first trail, so we made our way to the next one called Sugarloaf Mountain. Many more steps as well as climbing up moss covered rocks. By now at least the showers had stopped.

                                          Climbing....................

                               higher with every step..............

           but the 360 degree view was more than worth the climb.
                  Below the ferry making it's way back to Vancouver.

                                 Looking west, inland.

        Looking down on Nanaimo down town and the ferry dock

Our favourite place to walk is the Marina walk, 4 1/2km along the waterfront.

Sometimes Bev will take her book and have a coffee and a Biscotti in one of the little cafes while I catch dinner on the crabbing pier.

                                            Always something to see............

               I often go to the crabbing pier down there with friends from Alberta.

                                                The local harbour seal, Lucy

 And of course my "Red Neck" crabbing buddies. Well they call themselves "red necks" so they must be, eh? Wonderful people, so kind and so much fun.

 And a local Eagle who glides in to pluck a raw chicken drumstick (crab bait) from your hand. Quite remarkable! He was there between flights.

This is Spring?

Well after a very mild and dryer than usual Winter here, March has been disappointing to say the least.

Monday morning we awoke to snow! We drove to the gym in the snow, but at least at 11am when we came out, the snow had melted. 

Today, Wednesday, we are experiencing strong winds and wet snow again and just 2 degrees. While Ontario is experiencing amazingly warm weather, far above normal, we are far below normal here on the island. We could have camped in Ontario! 

Mountains in the mist.

However, yesterday was a beautiful sunny day and a group of ten of us from the park took the 10 minute water taxi ride from Nanaimo Harbour across to Protection Island to have lunch at the Dingy Dock Pub. 

On the way out we saw the boats at anchor between the two islands, Protection and Newcastle, which is a Provincial Park. The scene brought back memories of our year in the Bahamas.

        Below, approaching the Dingy Dock Pub. It is not really on an     angle. Don't ask.

 Above, Nanaimo Harbour from the island and below is the interior of the pub. Lots of beautifully authentic, nautical artifacts and paraphernalia, which gave a feeling of being on board a ship. The wood floor, was planks with rope between each plank.    

   The water taxi departing for Nanaimo Harbour in the background.

On Protection Island, besides the pub are about 300 homes. There are only a handful of cars due to the cost of taking them over on a barge. People either walk, bike or use a golf cart.

Below in the tree tops is a Great Blue Heron rookery. They breed in colonies a hundred feet up in the trees. They lay their eggs in large platform like nests. More than half of the worlds Great Blue herons are found in Canada, but their numbers are declining, mostly due to logging.                                                          

On our island walk we came across a woman attempting to haul a log, which she had salvaged from the water, up a steep ramp. Six of us grabbed the rope and the log was up. She and another woman pulled it onto a little trailer which was attached to a golf cart and off they went home with their firewood. Below, Bev is trying to pull it to the trailer. It was a beautiful sunny day, but a cold wind was blowing off the water.

Bev and I took the path that went up 67 steps to the next road, the others chose to go another way. And we are the oldest!! Heck we did many steps in England, as much as 190!!

                  This is one of very few vehicles on the island.