Friday, Saturday June 1st and 2nd, 2012
The contractors are done by noon on Friday. Jérémy and Danielle
have purchased a new stove yesterday.
Today we are moving the old and new stoves.
The old one go to "
Habitat
for Humanity".
And protecting the new stove during transport. Jérémy sure keeps
me busy!
I forgot to take a photo of the new stove in the house???
The "gang" come for a visit shortly after dinner. We went for a
nice stroll. Always fun to have them around!
After the walk, we have a nice campfire and told lies all evening
long!!!
Saturday morning Michèle and Julie went garage sale hopping while I did
a deep cleaning of the roof.
I even washed the inside of the air conditioner covers and the vent
covers.
It sure was needed.
A busy day!
Sunday June 3, 2012
Another grey day!
Will it rain (again) today?
I go for a walk to Air Force Beach while the tide is low.
As I am walking on the seaweed covered rocks, I noticed some very small
crabs.
Three of them are in the photo below.
A close up of one, very angry, crab!
After lunch, the weather is still uncertain with heavy clouds. We
decide to go for a car ride to Campbell River.
A nice smile on our way!
Campbell River is north of Comox and the 50th parallel goes right
through town.
Once back, the sun is actually out and shinning! The temperature
is still only +14.
Forecast for the week coming up, cloudy with 40% chance of rain.
I cannot wait to have more then three days of temperature above +22.
This is an evening of TV...
Monday, Tuesday June 4 and 5, 2012
Monday is a laid-back day. Jérémy came after his dental
appointment. We went for a nice walk on Air Force Beach.
Tuesday is another laid-back day. The sky is covered with clouds,
but still nice at +18, we even have some moment at +20.
I spend my day at the fire and playing around my web page.
With my Michèle.
Wednesday June 6, 2012
WOW! The sun is out and the temperature is warm (so far).
On our way to Mount Washington and the snow.
We have some coupons for a cheap breakfast at A&W. We spoil
ourselves.
Very little traffic on the road to Mount Washington. We take our
time.
Every so often we come across a new road signs that makes you go,
hummmm!
Once at Mount Washington, it cooled off by seven degrees.
We are at more than 1,000 meter above sea level.
The ski center is a lot bigger than what you see in this photo.
Just love this little lake.
Having fun!
The view to the east. The mountains you see in the distance
are on the mainland. On the right photo, the light brown patch on
this side of the water is the
Comox base.
I was surprise to see this logging truck. I guess they are still
logging on the island. We go down the mountain very slow.
We come back home by a different back roads. Got to see something
different, get a different taste of the local area.
We start to smell something awful, like poop! Not cow poop, but
human poop!
And then we see this sprinkler with the brown water...
Surprise! We heard that they may have some wild turkey on the
island.
We see two of them, here is the prettiest.
We got a new resident at the campground.
Some more permanent residents.
Jérémy's little family came for a short visit after dinner.
Thursday, Friday, June 7 and 8, 2012
Thursday is a gray day with high wind and light rain, boring day.
Friday is a lot better with sunny sky. We end the day with a
nice fire and a good book.
We got a call from Jérémy telling us he will be coming for dinner
tomorrow with the whole gang. Super!
That will be fun because Danielle's aunt is here for a visit.
Saturday, June 9, 2012
They all arrived at 4 pm. Jérémy, Danielle, Gabriel, grandmother
Colleen, Great-grandmother Julie, Corrine (aunt) and York, her
husband.
Michèle takes Gabriel right away. He is totally passed out.
After a few beers, a few of us went for a walk.
Grandmother Colleen. The four generation, Danielle, Colleen,
Julie and Gabriel.
Great grandmother Julie.
Our cooks. Danielle finds the BBQ pretty hot!
Jérémy got his quadcoptere with him and flies it for 15 minutes.
If you would like to see some of the video he took with his FPV
airplanes, search "Bomerang 5891" on youtube.com.
From L to R, York, Corrine, me, Michèle, Julie and Jérémy.
Danielle, Colleen and Gabriel are missing.
What a nice afternoon and early evening. Great people, lots of
fun, got to meet Corrine, Danielle's aunt, and her husband.
We had lots fun!
Sunday to Tuesday June 10 and 12, 2012
I have to catch up with my wood splitting. We burnt a lot
yesterday.
A little about the fire wood I have.
The military bought a used buffalo from Africa. They are turning
it into a training aid. When the aircraft arrived, it was all
crated up in big 4 X 6 and 4 X 4 pieces of lumber. Jeremy got a
whole lot of wood that was going to the dumpster. Jeremy had
already cut up a lot of it before we got here and when we arrived, I
helped him cut the rest. We cannot use this wood for cooking
because it was sprayed with insecticide. It sure burns nice and
it stacks easy!
Monday we are at the laundromat.
What was suppose to be an easy activity turned into quite an
experience. One of the top 10 in my life.
A man walked in with his dirty laundry, nothing special with that. He
takes the washing machine next to me and in the process, kind of block
me in the back. No worries. Only one problem, he
stinks! Then he takes out his dirty laundry and it stinks even
more. Now it really stinks and I am starting to gag! I
think
I am going to puke! I manage to get away from him and go to our
other machine towards the back. Even at more than 3 meters away,
I can still smell him! I go to the front of the store where the
doors are open it feels better. After a few minutes, I notice the
employee have open the back door to create a draft and take away some
of the smell. Very rare that something makes me gag, but this one
was the top. I even forgot to take a photo.
That was our Monday.
Tuesday morning and the rain is falling gently. Gray sky, low
clouds, even the light is gray. We don't move this morning.
Jeremy and Gabriel stop for a quick visit in the afternoon.
Gabriel has cramps in his little belly, then it stops, we have a
nice "gift" from him!
We love being grandparents.
Wednesday June 13, 2012
Jérémy and Danielle invited us for a nice hike at Nymph
Falls.
This river comes from Comox lake and is regulated by BC Hydro.
Danielle patiently waiting for us while we are taking photos near the
falls.
Just like the lake, the water is crystal clear.
Gabriel has some problems with his little tummy.
We love them!
Look like arms!
Nice little hike and the weather turned out OK after all.
Back at the campsite, I was taking the recycling out to the big can
when I saw this slug, must have been 3 inches long, with fangs!!!
Have no fear, I got the recycling done, even with this monster
looking at me.
I had this BBQ for a long time and I know I have to buy a new one
soon.
Today, I let the BBQ on for a little while to burn off the
grease.
Well, the handle fell off, actually, melted off. Time to go
shopping.
Another good day with the one we love.
Thursday June 14, 2012
One thing is sure, if we wait for good weather to travel, I
think we would
wait forever.
We are off to Victoria. It is raining when we leave Comox.
We head south and at North Cowichan, we take the highway 18 west to
Port Renfrew.
Part of the road is a logging road, even paved, it is still narrow in
many places.
One of 15 single lane bridges we crossed.
A few kilometers before Port Renfrew, we stop to see
a big spruce tree. It is more than 80 meters high.
First a photo of ourselves.
Here it is in all its glory. 200 years old and still
solid.
On the right photo, a collage on 3 photos to give you a
sense of how tall it is.
Pretty Michèle !!!
Next stop is the botanical beach park.
On our way to the beach.
When the tide is low, you can see all kinds of sea
life in the tidal pool left behind, from starfish to little fish.
It turns
out the high tide
was just a few hours earlier and still pretty high.
You really need good shoes to walk on the rocks.
At Port Renfrew, we left highway 18 to take highway 14 to
Victoria. We
assumed we would be traveling by the ocean for some of the
way. Well
we sure did see a lot of trees, but very little ocean.
Once in Victoria, we went to the information center and booked a room
for
the next two nights. We chose the
Dalton Hotel &
Suite, about 7 blocks from the parliament building.
We got the room at $100.00 a night. OK, but do not get misled by
the photos from the web site. If you pay more, you get the nice
room, not that our room was bad, just cheap!
We still have a few hours before sun down, so we visit
Chinatown.
The oldest Chinatown in Canada and the second oldest in north America
after San Fransisco.
A view of the Victorian harbour and the Parliament
building.
The
Empress
Hotel, built between 1904 and 1908 by the Canadian Pacific Railway.
They look like raisins, but they are California Lilacs.
The
British Columbia Parliament Building.
Open in 1898 at a cost of $400,000.00.
We had a very good dinner...
On our way back to the hotel, who do we see?
A Dark Vader playing
violin!
A busy day and tomorrow promises to be even busier.
Friday June 15, 2012
We are up and we have to make the best of the day. Got a lot to
see in Victoria.
On our way to the information center, we notice the downtown area has
free WIFI.
We decided to take the guided bus tour. It is an hop on - hop off
tour. The whole tour takes about one hour and a half. A
bus goes by every thirty minutes.
I am just surprised to see double decker city bus.
First stop is the Parliament building. Here is the legislative
chamber of BC.
Second stop is at the
Craigdarrock castle. Built in the early
1890, it has four stories and more than 20,000 square foot.
I have never seen a round radiator, they even had a quarter round
radiator.
A nice curved door.
Looking up the staircase to the fourth floor.
Pretty much the whole house had the paneling you see here.
A very modern bathroom for its time. Even toilet paper.
Hummm! What is this dish used for?
Do you know?
I will tell you at the end of this day.
A view from the top floor. The mountain range you see in the
distance is the Olympic range and it is in Washington state.
Our next stop is at "Mile 0" of the
Trans-Canada highway.
The other end of the Trans-Canada highway is 7820 kilometers east.
Hiding!
By 2 pm, it is time for lunch at Fisherman's Wharf.
Barb's is in the top 10 seafood place by the ocean in North America.
The Fish & Chips are good, but not as good as the one from
Bowpicker in Astoria.
There are a few more restaurants on the wharf and with food comes wild
life.
These seals are not afraid of human.
They even come
to get bait fish from your hands.
Fisherman's Wharf also has about a dozen floating houses.
Many are for sale and they are asking over $290,000.00 for the
little house.
I guess, he is a diver and wanted to show his treasures, I hope he took
the batteries out of the cell phone.
We head back to our room for a short rest.
One
of the bar has a very neat advertisement sign by its door.
I love it.
Later on, we head backdown towards the harbour to the IMAX theater and
watched Rocky Mountain
Express.
We were a little disappointed. If you like steam locomotive,
great, but very few breathtaking scenes you expect from IMAX.
Nighttime at the harbour.
The Parliament illuminated.
WOW! What a busy day. Back in our room sometime after 10 pm.
Now the answer to the question about the dish.
It is a cheese dish.
Back then, the cheese was cut like a piece
of pie and placed side way on the plate and covered.
Until next time.
Life is good...