Rebecca M. Douglass, Author

A week or so back I made a start at a report on my August BC kayak trip . I've been out in the mountains, so not much chance to edit the photos and put together more posts, but I did get pictures from Day 3, which was one of our 2 longest paddling days, and the longest with fully-loaded boats--about 11.5 miles. We started the day at Red Point camp. I'm an early riser, so I got the pretty morning light, and a few whale-spouts (not shown). The tide was down, so there were some interesting critters left high and dry (like this anemone). Getting ready to launch Launching. All our launches involved wet feet. I found that my water shoes let water in, but not out--not the ideal set-up! We made a couple of stops along the way, first to look at the shell-mound midden on one island, then another for lunch at a beach that was disappearing fast while we ate! Lunch stop. Looking out from lunch. Later we stopped at Village Island, a historic site run by the First Nations people. Visits are b...

I'm making only one promise about this trip report: it's going to take a while to get to the end, because I'm heading out for more adventures and have no expectation of getting all the photos edited, let alone posts created, before I leave. August 9-14 (actually 8-15 counting the trip up and back), two friends and I joined a small group kayaking adventure out of Port McNeill, BC, to the Broughton Archipelago. The trip started, for me, with a rendezvous at my house at 7:30 a.m. to drive to the ferry in Canada. We gave ourselves tons of time for the border crossing, which in fact took only about 5 minutes. I wasn't taking chances--we had a ferry to catch. I don't take a lot of photos of ferries, but this line in the water was particularly striking. It's the flow from the Fraser River refusing to mingle with the waters of the Salish Sea. After the 2 hour ferry ride, we had another 4 hour drive to Pt. McNeill--it really is a long way from anywhere! In the evening th...

In addition to the recent hike on the West Coast Trail, I enjoyed a few smaller adventures on Vancouver Island recently. Enjoy the photos! Besides the beaches on the trail, we visited Quadra Island and found some pretty beaches there. Tidepools with crabs, as well as tiny fish and shrimp (not shown). Comox Harbour Rebecca Spit. Of course, with a name like that, I had to visit! I also took a hike in the Paradise Lakes area of Strathcona Provencial Park. Paradise Meadows Battleship Lake Mountain stream Of course, a trip like this was also all about the ferries (all told, including the tiny "ferry" that took us down the lake to start the backpack trip, we rode 5). Large BC Ferries vessels to take us from Tsawassen (Vancouver BC) to Nanaimo. Leaving Vancouver, Mt. Baker dominates the skyline to the south. There's a sharp line where the muddied waters of the Fraser River flow into the Salish Sea. The small ferries that serve Quadra and the other islands are open-ended like the...