Roberts Memorial Provincial Park is in Yellow Point, British Columbia. It is a lovely short hike through ancient trees and abundant ferns to the coast where there is a view of Ruxton Island and Valdes Island. We also saw a sea lion and a loon that were happily ignoring each other and us.
Category: Exploring
Nothing Gold Can Stay*
The weather forecast is for snow tonight, so before the leaves are all blown away or covered up, here are today’s colours. *Nothing Gold Can Stay by Robert Frost Nature’s first green is gold,Her hardest hue to hold.Her early leaf’s a flower;But only so an hour.Then leaf subsides to leaf.So Eden sank to grief,So dawn […]
Rathtrevor Beach Provincial Park
Today I went with two newcomer friends to this wonderful park. It has the best of everything; beach, ocean waves, enormous old-growth trees, bright ferns, geese, ducks, and even a seal sighting. The trails are very accessible with wide flat paths and there are several lookout spots with information on the land, sea, and wildlife. […]
Nanaimo Shorebirds
Here are some of the many shorebirds that I see when I walk along the harbourfront in Nanaimo. In these photos are gulls, crows, and some birds that I think may be either plovers or killdeers. I will appreciate identification from any birders who see this. They are always a delight to watch and surprisingly […]
How To Open Shellfish
All along the beach at Nanaimo are the broken shells of shellfish. The gulls and other shorebirds have figured out that the rocks are a great place to smash open these little calcium carbonate structures in order to feed on the inhabitants If you have seen The Lion King, you know all about the circle […]
Driftwood Textures
After I read about a magnificent sculpture of a humpback whale made of driftwood, I was inspired to go out and take a few pictures of driftwood on the beach near me. There is a surprisingly wide variety of types of wood and textures, and some pieces look as though they have lived a very […]
Capitola, California
Beach, sand, gulls, surfers, colourful cottages, ukulele musicians, family, and very friendly people. This is the California of my imagination. We sang along with golden oldies for over an hour and my sister danced with the beat. Then we enjoyed a lunch overlooking the picturesque cottages and a pond filled with a gazillion gulls and […]
Pfeiffer Beach at Big Sur, California
There is a very narrow and winding road down to this beach in California. If two vehicles need to pass each other, one of them has to back up to one of the occasional passing spaces. The beach is famous for the holes in the rocks that sometimes line up with the sun. Some determined […]
Neck Point Park, Nanaimo
I have joined a group that takes an easy hike (4 km or less) once a week. So far they have introduced me to three different parks, all within the city of Nanaimo. Today we went to Neck Point Park which is described on the city’s website as follows: “Neck Point is a destination waterfront […]
Hemer Provincial Park
Hemer Provincial Park, near Cedar, British Columbia, is one of many delightful parks in this area. Today some friends from the newcomers group introduced me to the trails here, and we enjoyed a four kilometre walk among the trees. First we stopped by the pond where there are lots of Canada geese and a great […]
Seeing Green
I was not feeling jealousy, and I was not anticipating money, and I was definitely not thinking about the Nicki Minaj song. I was literally seeing green on the rocks by the shore today. At first I thought someone had gone down there with a can of neon spray paint and sprayed a message on […]
Bowen Park
Next week there is to be a gathering of newcomers to Nanaimo at Bowen Park, and I am thinking of attending. Since I don’t know either this group of people or the park, I thought it wise to check out the location prior to trying to find it on the day of the meeting. It […]
Transitory Brilliance
A few days ago, I posted some images of some carefully balanced rocks that were at the water’s edge. A couple of days later they were no longer there. Today, in between rain showers I took a walk and saw some more stacked stones. When I had stopped to take a couple of photos, I […]
Good Morning
Nanaimo harbour, early morning 10 August 2022.
Parksville Sand Sculptures 2022
The theme for this year’s Parksville Sand Sculpture competition is The Roaring Twenties (or Twentys perhaps), and each visitor is given a token with which to make their selection for the People’s Choice Award. All the sculptures are well designed and well-executed so it is a hard choice.