Tag Archives: Pacific Northwest

Blog, Photo Wednesday, Wanderings

Goldstream, Quick Water-Photo Wednesday

When you are on Vancouver Island and you have an hour to spare, it’s sooo easy to get lost in the woods…

Near the western suburbs of Victoria, a few kilometers from the big box stores, Goldstream Provincial Park is another world in which to go and do some deep breathing.  Allow yourself some time to take in all that velvety green beauty.

Spring Water in BC. Photo © Andrée Fredette

After a rain, the Goldstream river just flows. And the sound of it just flows through you!

This reminds me of L’eau vive, a song by Guy Béart. (There is a touching YouTube video of an aging Guy Béart in concert, in which the audience sings most of the song to him…). Those of you who grew up in the same era, in the same place, or in France, are already humming the tune, I know…

Ma petite est comme l’eau, elle est comme l’eau vive
Elle court comme un ruisseau, que les enfants poursuivent
Courez, courez vite si vous le pouvez
Jamais, jamais vous ne la rattraperez

Lorsque chantent les pipeaux, lorsque danse l’eau vive
Elle mène les troupeaux, au pays des olives
Venez, venez, mes chevreaux, mes agnelets
Dans le laurier, le thym et le serpolet

Un jour que, sous les roseaux, sommeillait mon eau vive
Vinrent les gars du hameau pour l’emmener captive

Fermez, fermez votre cage à double clé
Entre vos doigts, l’eau vive s’envolera

Comme les petits bateaux, emportés par l’eau vive
Dans ses yeux les jouvenceaux voguent à la dérive
Voguez, voguez demain vous accosterez
L’eau vive n’est pas encore à marier

Pourtant un matin nouveau à l’aube, mon eau vive
Viendra battre son trousseau, aux cailloux de la rive
Pleurez, pleurez, si je demeure esseulé
Le ruisselet, au large, s’en est allé.

Blog, Inspiration

Foggy Sky

It was a very foggy week. Day after day, the ferries were sounding their way across the waters. The bigger cargo ships also signaled their movements with their horns. Fog is quiet, but it is also noisy…

One day, in the late afternoon, I looked out the window and this is what the sky looked like.

January Light, Saturna Island. Photo © Andrée Fredette

I also noticed a lot of activity on the water surface: seals and birds, looking for food, were rippling the water, leaving temporary tracks…

An hour or so later, the sun was still trying to burn through the thick fog blanket. Nearing sunset time, the colour of the sky started to change completely, going from grey to gold… with the golden results that followed…

January Light Beam Later2
And finally, the fog thickened, and blocked the sunset over Pender Island…

January Sky, before sunset. Photo © Andrée Fredette

Around here, it pays to look out the window on a regular basis.

Blog

Winter Melancholy

Nostalgie hivernale WL

A winter dusk moment, when the sunlight is about to disappear. The Garry oaks that tough it out on the exposed bluffs below our house are denuded in winter, and their silhouette is quite stark.

This hour of the day, this time of the year… together, they bring a feeling of loss. Remembering people who have come and gone.  Raise a glass, think good thoughts.

Blog, Photo Wednesday, Wanderings

Lion’s Mane Jellyfish, on the Dry – Photo Wednesday

Today’s picture is from my old files of things that live around here…

During a walk on the beach at low tide in the summertime, quite a few lion’s mane jellyfish were trapped at low tide, and dried up.  Some of them can be quite sizable, and if you try to lift them (not with your hands, but with a stick, say, or a paddle if you are in a kayak), you find out how heavy these creatures are…

This one was high up on the beach, blown there by wind and wave action, dead and drying up. It looked like a fine glass object. Abstract art. I am guessing that this is the pattern of what passes for “muscles” in a jelly.
Lions Mane Jelly Dry WL

Blog, Just Because, Photo Wednesday

Long-term parking for the Tug and Boom – Photo Wednesday

This tug spent at least a week in a holding pattern, in front of the house. Up and down the Sound it went, very slowly… dragging the raft of logs. In BC, this is called a log boom.

At night, the tug has horizontal lighting, signalling its “parked” position, and the log boom also has position lights, light green, at all corners. Avoiding navigational hazards…

A whole forest is chained up, and floated behind a tug. Eventually, after a proper wait (at least a week, in this case) for a spot at the Port of Vancouver, it gets dragged across the Strait of Georgia, to the lower mainland of BC… Where all the log booms are gathered in the river’s mouth, also parked and waiting for loading. Most of these logs are likely loaded on ships headed West. Across the Pacific.

Floating Forest November 2014 WL
I am not complaining, my house is made of local cedar, so are my decks… I just watch cedar islands being floated across the waters.

I wonder what it’s like to be the tug’s pilot and crew. Do they play Scrabble? Watch videos? Play cards? How do they pass the time?