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the
journey began bloody early in the morn on july 24th....
you can imagine how hard my sister/her mum was crying....
with
one connecting flight in toronto...
michelle bravely flew across our fine country,
over the rockies and majestic whathaveyous...
for
nine flippin hours (!) until she reached vancouver
and was reunited with her beloved auntie cvm and uncle poochie.
was
i happy to see her...
and
so, once refreshed, we went directly to stanley park,
in
order to meet up with her other auntie 'cat'
whom she had never met until now.
wish
i had taken more pix of the two of them,
but i was caught up in the emotion of it all...
stanley
park is full of wildlife...stanley
very
friendly wildlife...s
and
big a** trees!
pretty
pooped and wanting more, so we
stayed the night in a
sleezy hotel downtown, it was really noisy -
couldnt tell from the website man...
at least she could sleep.
second
day in vancouver we went to the vancouver aquarium.
plenty cool let me tell ya...
this
dolphin was giving a voluntary blood sample...freaky.
you
have no idea how big this fish was...
baby
ibis with butterfly for dinner...
beluga
whale in spitting contest...
cant
stay in the big city forever so we packed up and
hopped the ferry to vancouver island.
note:
we do not live in vancouver, we live in victoria,
on vancouver island.
there is a big difference maaan...
and
a big ferry...
with
2 arcades, a gift shop, a couple of restaurants
and massaging chairs even...
we
took a cool double decker bus all the way down the island
from the ferry terminal to downtown victoria
(bus not exactly as shown)
finally
reaching her new home - thats the building on the left.
wee one bedroom with balcony...
pickle slept on the couch/futon...
and swam in the pool! open and heated - all year round...
we live right next door to - of all things - south park
school...
seriously...
pooped
from the journey and excitement of it all....
the next few days we we crashed in beacon hill park...
beacon
hill park is directly across the street from our apartment.
we
spent a lot of time there over the next month...
it
has a zilion flowers and trees
and
a herony... with tons of great blue herons...
and
lots of crows...this one was dead tho...
and
on a happier note; a petting zoo!
with
vietnemese pot bellied piglets!
the
brown sheep of the family...
baby
bunnies...
alpacas...
and
lots of peacocks...
peahens...
an albino peacock even...
and the best baby goat free-for-all...
we
went back again and again for goat lovins....
seems
like the mums are always preggers...
at
the end of each day they have something called a goat run
- or the running of the goats...l...
people
line up along side the farm and make a human fence
- herding the goats to the big barn for dinner...
we all yell 'come on babies, come on babies'
in
the evenings we would picnic down at the bottom of our street...
its spectacular there...
reid
should not be allowed time alone with the camera tho...
we
sometimes went out for dinner
at our friend's restaurant - where reid works:
the
queen mother waterside cafe
our
dear friend/roommate tracy (left) was there,
and our good pal heather (right) who was visiting from calgary
just
a side note, but there was baby swans at tracy's
...forgot to take other pix
we saw swans and baby swans...
one
day we visited our pals kelly and andre
- they own the restaurant
- and are old chums from toronto.
this
is their dog doris (before her spa day)
swell
pad...
sweet
view
went
to see the snowbirds in the park behind their place
with tim and patrick...
kelly,
andre and us also went for a walk around beaver/elk lake
where we saw a wasps nest up real close
and
a swallows nest too...very cool
then
we went on a bizarre adventure outside of town
to this place - random and strange - you'll see...
a
huge maze - made of corn...maize - get it?
with
some strange egyptian theme park...
honkin
big fibre glass molds of the pyramid and the sphinx..
we
climbed on it but really shouldnt have...
it
was a hot one...
there
was also a ghost town with no real people
just
these creepy mannequins...
of
course we spent a lot of time hangin around the house
reading,
writing, practicing guitar...
doing peel-off face masks .... the usual...ya know?
michleee
took this opportunity to stop biting her fingernails once
and for all
this
was the first banana she was able to open all on her own
with her fab new thumbnail.
she
got to ride around on 'georgio'
- auntie's vintage italian folding bike..
can you say 'grampa runs faster than that'???
but hey, giorgio is cool.
next
was a grand journey to salt spring island for a camping
trip
another
ferry, but much smaller this time...
heather
drove...
as
soon as we got to our campsite we saw a deer hanging around...
not
too shy...
our
campsite was right by the water...
ruckle park...
you could even see the ferries go by
a
relaxing time was had...
not
everyone wants to be so relaxed that you trim your toenails
in front of them,
but hey, its natural...
and he is...
auntie
brought her uke...
star
fish are nifty...
sea
moss....
we
peed on that tree many times....
went swimmin in one of the wee lakes...
found
a turtle..
and
a little boy to feed and look after...
he
was sweet on michelle but we couldnt keep him...
arbutus
trees everywhere...
when
we went in town we had fish-n-chips at the seaside...
complete
with photo-op
much
of our reason for visiting saltspring island
was to catch a vinyl
cafe show at the artspring theatre.
the
show was amazing, michlele is a new fan as expected.
and it was super swellto see our pals stuart and jess again..
after the show stuart and jess and matheir friend maxine
took us for a long walk down a dark road...
to see the phosporesence! like freaks we jumped off a dock
in
the middle of the flippin night into dark cold water! thats
reid and jess...
i was the 2nd one in (reid 1st) and already out shivering...
this
is a photo of michelle sitting next to stuart in his underwear...
needless
to say, its hard to take good pix in the dark when yer
standing freezing soaking wet in your bra and panties...
and
i have to say that can be serious consequences to scrambling
up out of the water in the dark with the two feet above
ya...
poor heather took a beating. but what a great time!!
did
i mention how cool camping on saltspring is?
just fabulous...
there
was a fire ban tho, so we had to use a bug candle instead...
on
the way back to the ferry we couldnt resist a photo op
with this crazy zamboni...
speaking
of home...we have since moved into the house that used to
be
rufus'
island guitar shop
it's
where i work some days and where michelle came to work for
a whole week.
we were having a big moving sale and needed the help...
she
worked her butt off and bought herself a sims game...of
course.
hanging
out with rufus and all these guitars
certainly helping the pickle get pickin'.
daytrippin
at goldstream provincial park with tracy...
 \
ths
waterfall fed pond was freakin freezin...
tracy
has to be out of her mind...
serious
blackberry pickin goin on...
what
you dont see is me carrying michelle out of this bog
while being persued by a big fat bee...
time
to go home...
we
saw this freaky thing on our way down to the water
by our house for another evening picnic...
our
extremely juicy friend miles joined us
as he was in town being a stylist on some film...
it
made the photo ops more fun i think...
it
took us a couple of weeks to get around to going downtown...
whats
the big deal about the empress hotel anyways?
undersea
gardens was worth a trip tho...
they
have 3 octopus (octopi?)
but
it's just too sad to see this diver manhandle them every
hour for the tourists...
is
this any kind of example for the kids i ask?
they
have a whole floating house village down by fishermans wharf
thats what auntie cat is building...
some
of them are pretty darn cute...like the banana boat
victoria
is on a bit of a bear thing right now...used to be killer
whales
this
one wasx spooky...
bear
bum...
michelle
manhandles all of the islands mascots tho...
china
town has the narrowist commercial street in - northamerica?
cant remmember. its called fantan alley...pretty cool.
its
easy being green here....
she
liked in when we coordinated - who was i to discourage her...
the
johnson bridge...
back
to the restaurant for a little photo op
and some of the best spring rolls in the world...
we
flare our nostrils in your general direction...
kelly
knows how to look after the girlies...
miles
returned between sets...
michelle
following in her boozer auntie's footsteps...
just
kidding...she only drinks water...not even pop...ahead of
her time i tell ya.
next
we were off - upisland for many reasons...
we
went to visit reid's great uncle howard and aunt vi in nanaimo
we
had a little jam with the boys in the basement...
nice
1952 gibson he has...sweet!
plays
real nice...runs in the family dontcha know...
goes
by 'howie james' tho...
not that there is anything wrong with 'jamieson'
they
took us for a trip down to the waterfront...
got
us some non dairy icecreams even...
mango
and rasberry...
we
hadnt planned to stay the night, but who could resist...
they
kept us up til 3am...a great time was had...we shall return...
next
we went to rathtrevor beach, where you can swim in the georgia
strait..
warmest salt water in canada i imagine...
we
read by the sea...
i
started her off with to kill a mockingbird...nice eh?
next
stop was the home of charlotte and rufus in parksville
with
all its many outbuildings...like the jewellry shop
the
guitar shop
green
house...
even
a dog house
and
lots of flowers...
charlotte
and rufus were preparing for their wedding the next day
they
had friends and family from all over staying at the house...
including
the charming guitar maker oskar graf
and
chessie of course...
we
stayed in a deluxe suite just to the side of the property...
a
swell camper that they were going to take on their honeymoon...
the
next day was a beauty...
just
like the bride...
a
perfect day
and
michelles first wedding
all
the flowers came from their garden...
reid
played at the wedding
it
was a quaker wedding and we formed a large circle
and met every person there personally...twas nice.
best
new pal award goes to kabir...what a dude.
needless
to day, there was music...
after
the show michelle and i snuck up on stage for some
tomfoolery and another photo-op.
introducing...
the
chickpeas!
the
next day was perfect for snoozin...we was pooped.
thats
charlottes mum asleep on the other couch...
man she was cute. and man did we have a great time.
on
the way back to town we stopped for fish and chips
served
right on a boat...
it
was getting close to time for michelle to go home,
so we returned to the petting zoo in beacon hill park..
and
her favourite baby goat 'edmond'
the
park was still beautiful..
same
goes for the pickle...
dont
forget to call mum and let her know that pickle will return
soon...
we
went down to the harbour to meet up with kelly and andre
(andre was away but now returned - yeay!)
you
can tell i am already close to crying...
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