A weekend in Algonquin Provincial Park

True wilderness requires a little bit of work to get to and from. It also includes a bit of discomfort and annoyance. However, it is worth every bit of it.

This weekend a good friend of mine, Adam Gregg, joined Zeus and I on a trek into Ontario's Algonquin Provincial Park while Chris enjoyed a much deserved break from camping with a couple of nights in a soft bed and access to a large bathtub. But initially I had a sense of foreboding when we arrived in Kingston early on Friday morning. It appeared the rain that had been following us across much of Canada had caught up to us once again. Sheets of it were falling throughout much of our drive from Toronto to Kingston, and we were told by the motel clerk when we checked in the past two weeks had seen nearly continuous rain. However, while it remained overcast until the final couple of hours of our time in Algonquin, rain was light and rare, and temperatures remained comfortable.

After a night in a developed campground, Adam and I got ourselves a permit for a backcountry site about 12.5 kilometres from the main road through Algonquin Park. Located on Eu Lake, ours was the only campsite on the lake. The lake itself was surrounded by hills blanketed beneath a sea of vibrant green, and, nourished by the recent rains, everything was pregnant with the promise of remaining that way through the summer. From maple, birch, and poplar to pine and hemlock, the thick woods made it easy to imagine the nearest person was much more likely to be hundreds of kilometres away than camping somewhere along the same trail we had just hiked.

The trail in, however, had also been heavily affected by all the recent moisture. The Oxtongue River passes immediately beneath the bridge next to the parking lot that marks the beginning of the Western Uplands network of trails. Well passed flood stage, it had inundated the trail on the other side of the bridge. It was impossible to roll our pants up high enough to avoid a good soaking. While Zeus relished the opportunity to hike through water, Adam and I weren't sure what a trail that just a couple of hundred metres from the parking lot required us to remove our shoes and roll up our pants might have in store for us. The water never got anywhere near that deep again, but we sank ankle deep into mud both coming and going more times than either of us would care to count.

Then there were the mosquitoes. We finished off what was left of the bug repellent about the time we reached Eu Lake some four hours or so after departing. Between the load we had carried in on our backs and the litre or so of blood it felt like we had each donated to the local insect population, we were both eager for a restful night in one of the most beautiful forest environments either of us had ever experienced. It wasn't long before the fire was going and the local loons were welcoming their most recent visitors to their home. But even with the high water, mud, insects, and the exhaustion we both felt upon returning to the car the next day, it was worth it. In truth, probably our biggest complaint is that we didn't have more time to spend in the area.

But even if the weekend was too short, it was good to reunite with a friend and hiking companion, and to both share in the experience of visiting a place we had never been before. Chris, Zeus, and I will likely be turning back to the west after our stay in Kingston, though our route back and the exact timing of our return, or where exactly we will be returning to, is yet to be determined. For one thing, watching game one of the Stanley Cup Finals (GO CANUCKS!) is a must before we hit the road. And there may be at least one more weekend of camping in the area in store as well. Time in the wilderness allows one to feel completely in the moment, and to forget what is behind the forested hills for a while. It is difficult to contemplate what next week brings, let alone the days and weeks after that, and it feels worthwhile not to be rushed any more than absolutely necessary; especially after some time in Algonquin.

One of the best ways to travel

Listening to a guest on a CBC program the other day talk about her experience at a US airport with the new body scanners, or more accurately how she was treated when she refused to use one, Chris and I both agreed our way was a better way to travel. Of course, we're not on a business trip and we don't have to be back to work in a week or two. There's no doubt such constraints impose themselves in ways we don't have to deal with.

But, if your goal is to get to know a place, region, or country getting out from under those constraints as best you can is a must. For one thing, you meet people and hear stories you won't hear on a guided tour or a more rushed trip planned to a fare-thee-well. The story of our two Keiths makes our point. We told you about the Keith we met in the Rockies in our May 20th post. We met Keith number two at Godson Lake south of Dryden, Ontario during our brief stay there the night of May 24th.

Keith 2 used to work at the paper mill in Dryden, but between modernization and the recession, the mill went from approximately 1,200 employees a few years back to little more than 200 now; a huge hit for a small, remote town in northwestern Ontario like Dryden. Keith had his trailer set up just off the road in a camp on crown lands typically used by local fisherman spending a day or two on Godson Lake, about 30 km south of Dryden. Unlike Keith number one, this Keith hasn't lost his home and was able to escape the paper mill with a severance package, but like Keith number one in the Rockies, Keith two isn't sure what he's going to do next and is just making it up as he goes. As a man in his mid 50s from northern Ontario, he doesn't see a lot of options out there.

That said, our experience with Keiths so far makes us believe there really is something in a name. Chris says she used to work with one, and he was a nice guy too. Keith two had me over for a couple of beers and played ball with Zeus. Spending as much time as he does living out of his trailer on crown land (that's public land to our American readers), he enjoys the opportunity to meet people passing through. But Keith's story isn't one you'll hear on a typical vacation.

Then, of course, there's the local environment. Another aspect of place typically flown over or simply passed through without much comment these days. How many of us take the time to really look into the night sky, for example? Godson Lake, being as remote as it was, didn't have a hint of light pollution. When it finally got really dark near midnight, the moonless sky was full of stars from horizon to horizon. The lake was so calm, the stars looked like tiny glowing stones laying on the bottom of the lake. One could almost as easily have enjoyed the night sky by sitting and staring at the surface of the water as by craning their neck to see what the heavens had on display.

The night was also regularly interrupted by the plaintive sound of the loons living nearby. By morning the loons were silent and the lake was shrouded in a low fog that burned off within an hour or so, but the hour spent watching the fog slowly retreat across the lake revealing each of the lakes three small islands, one after another, was not a wasted hour by any stretch of the imagination.

Now we sit in a small, some might say "cheap" motel called the Rongie Lake Motel about midway between Thunder Bay and Sault Ste Marie on the northern shore of Lake Superior. The owners run a restaurant below the motel's five or so rooms, and it was fun eating and actually feeling a bit like a part of this small community while doing so. We were the only ones at the restaurant last night beside the owners and two locals, and so we were often invited to join in the conversation and felt right at home. But again, this place wouldn't even get a second look on a tour or thoroughly planned vacation.

Finally, driving across the second largest country on earth is, outside walking or riding a bicycle, the best way to get a sense of its enormity. Ontario alone takes at least two or three days of solid driving just to get across, to say nothing of experiencing what it has to offer. While the transition from the Rockies to the prairies to boreal forest can be witnessed from a plane window, if you're lucky enough to have a flight taking you over all three, the transition can only truly be experienced on the ground. Likewise, driving through the record flooding along the Assiniboine River between a canyon of sandbags holding back the water on either side of you is a unique experience that we will likely never be able to repeat.

Chris, Zeus, and I are all looking forward to a relaxing weekend, with little to no automobile travel. We'll let you know what's coming next soon. We will also share with you some of Zeus' adaptions to life on the road in an upcoming post, and all of us are looking forward to watching the Stanley Cup finals with some Canadians - GO CANUCKS!!. That's all for now.

A few days on Lake Diefenbaker - Saskatchewan Landing Provincial Park

We are definitely not in the Pacific Northwest any more. Our location these past three days is more like Wyoming, or perhaps even some portions of the Great Basin, only without the islands in the sky rising up from the high desert floor. There is sage, prickly pear cactus, primrose, and milkvetch scattered among the short grass growing here on the low rolling hills. Last night [May 21st] a lone coyote started to howl, triggering a domino effect that ended with what must have been 15-20 others joining in, along with a few Canadian geese from the lake.

We’ve had a bit of rain, but now it feels more like interior western rain, as opposed to the steady north-western rain we’ve experienced over the past year, and which followed us on this trip all the way to the Rockies. Saturday night was the only heavy rain, and though it sounded the same against the walls of our tent, the air remained warmer and drier and the storm passed quickly by recent standards.

The birds seem nosier and more abundant here, though given the environment this is certainly an illusion. The wide open spaces uninterrupted by trees allows sounds to travel further, and what birds are present tend to concentrate in greater numbers in what shrubs and trees there are available. However, the lack of forest cover also makes bird watching easier than it was in the thick forests of British Columbia.

Among the several species we’ve seen, the largest by far were two American white pelicans. In flight against the short grass and sage that define the undeveloped portions of the park, they appear as though from another planet. Even the Canada geese seem relatively small next to the pelicans, especially when seen soaring overhead.

We are located in the campground located furthest from the entrance to the park, in a spot reserved for tent campers. Since there are well over 200 campsites designated for RVs and trailers, and only about 30 in our location 2km up the road from everyone else, tent campers are clearly considered a rare breed. In spite of the fact it is Canada’s first long weekend of the summer season, for quite a while after our arrival it appeared we would have the entire tent area to ourselves. Ultimately someone did take one other site for the weekend, with a third occupied briefly for about a day.

In spite of the fact we are largely alone, we have definitely noticed our provincial park experiences have a far different feel to them. There is an air of regimentation about them that is definitely lacking when camping in undeveloped natural areas. We’ve come to expect parks to represent an attempt to conserve nature, but when there’s a golf course, general store, laundromat, and showers just down the road, and only one unadvertised nature trail, it’s difficult to see them that way, the crow building its nest right next to our picnic table and coyotes howling at night not withstanding. Zeus and I are breaking the rules every time we venture off into the hills blazing our own trail or following the multiple paths cut through the grass by deer, and the only communication we’ve had with the local conservation officer regarded the need to keep Zeus on a leash even if there wasn’t anyone around. Looking like he was fresh out of high school, the conservation officer apparently had nothing better to do until holiday weekend activities really began to heat up then come by and check on us every couple of hours or so, begging the question what exactly he’s been hired to conserve.

Part of it is no doubt the relative size of most of these provincial parks. Limited to a few thousand hectares at most, they are too small to adequately serve as nature preserves and when situated on a lake, as in this case, are fated to become a playground rather than a sanctuary. While we delight in being the only ones out on the dirt road that traverses the final 2 or 3 kilometres of this park looking at the birds and flowers that make up the local environment, it is difficult to not also bemoan the fact that of the hundreds of people currently camping here we are the only ones doing any looking. Such seeming disregard reflects a larger attitude toward nature that humanity is apart from nature, not a part of it.

When the job of a young conservation officer is to make sure dogs are leashed, alcohol isn’t being consumed, and quiet time begins promptly at 10:00 PM, conservation is nothing more than glorified policing. I am reminded of a quote by Aldo Leopold from his 1948 classic A Sand County Almanac: “In 1909, when I first saw the West, there were grizzlies in every major mountain mass, but you could travel for months without meeting a conservation officer. Today there is some kind of conservation officer ‘behind every bush,’ yet as wildlife bureaus grow, our most magnificent mammal retreats steadily toward the Canadian border.” Until next time.

Learning to take what comes

It’s easy to love nature when your time in it is largely limited to weekend camping trips or annual vacations. To learn to respect it and really learn from it, however, takes more prolonged exposure, ideally under at least somewhat hostile conditions.

I never thought of myself as having overly romantic notions about nature, but the past couple of weeks have taught me otherwise. Chris, on the other hand, has surprised me with her ability to endure days of harsh weather conditions. Through it all she’s mended a tent, cooked excellent meals, and spent hours sitting in the tent waiting out storms without complaint, often reading a whole book in a single day while she does it. I, however, find myself responding to the almost unrelenting rain by wanting to accelerate our movement across Canada until finally conditions change. My patience has now worn thin to the point no camping spot gets more than 24 hours. If by then, conditions haven’t improved, we move on.

But yesterday morning we met a man by the name of Keith who lives year round in his trailer on the eastern slopes of the Rockies. About the time we were leaving our apartment in Metchosin, he was digging out of snow drifts at least as high as his trailer so he could move to a location just a few hundred metres from our last campsite. Keith had agreed to give us a jump-start, as our battery had died, and later, just as we were getting ready to leave, he brought us some hot stew. He declined the offer of money for his help, and asked us to look him up if we came back through the area on our return trip.

Keith lives in the Rockies because in 2005 he lost his job. Not long thereafter he lost his home and his wife left him. Now it’s just him, his 4WD Blazer, and a small trailer he moves from one place to the next as the seasons change and resources allow. In these times, it’s unfortunately not hard to believe Keith is far from alone.

Keith wasn’t complaining about the weather. In fact, after living through a winter that involved ten feet or more of snow, today’s rainstorm was to him a walk in the park. And his willingness to stay in one place for months at a time means he sees things the rest of us miss. He asked if we had seen the mother black bear with her two cubs living on the ridge right above our camp. We hadn’t. He mentioned a grizzly he had seen in the area not long ago as well. Then he gave us a couple of hand warmers, came back a little later with that hot stew, told us to keep the container and wished us a happy journey.

So I find myself a bit ashamed I’ve let nature get to me and how quickly after leaving camp yesterday morning I forgot all about Keith, who like Zeus sitting right behind while we drive from one place to the next, has learned to roll with the punches. Instead, when it appeared our sunroof had broken today, because something went wrong with the bag strapped to our roof rack, I got frustrated and angry. And when we got a large rock chip in our windshield, I decided I couldn’t take it any more and we called it a day. But reflecting back on Keith I realize nature and all its associated mishaps aren’t the problem, my attitude toward them is. So let it rain and rocks along the road fly where they may. Like most things in life, it’s beyond my control anyway. However, being a bit more like Keith - and Zeus - in the face of it is within my control.

We’ll be leaving Medicine Hat this morning, and entering the Central Time Zone upon crossing the border into Saskatchewan. We’re not sure where we’ll be tonight, or how long we’ll stay there. Regardless, it’s probably time to find a place to stop and experience for a while, no matter what the weather is like.

May 18th – The Rapture Comes Early - and, if you live right, often.

Shortly before arriving at our current campsite, it came to our attention at least a few zealots had marked their calendars for this coming Saturday, May 21st, as the date the rapture was finally going to take place. Being Victoria Day weekend here in Canada, we can only assume, no matter what Newt Gingrich or Pat Robertson might say to the contrary, this means Jesus is a Canadian.

My dictionary defines rapture simply as a state of “spiritual or emotional ecstasy.” My thesaurus provides synonyms such as “elation”, “euphoria”, “exhilaration”, “intoxication”, and “rhapsody”. It also includes the words “heaven”, “paradise” and “transport”, though I don’t get the impression the editors at Merriam Webster’s were thinking along the same lines as those spending most of their waking hours praising Jesus in hopes this somehow makes them more appealing people to spend eternity with.

“So why a post about rapture in a blog about travelling across Canada?” I hear you asking. Because it occurred to me this morning as I was climbing the mountains northwest of our camp, rapture is a state of mind, a way of being, or a process. It is not an event. It is not something you wait for, and certainly not something you pray for; it’s something you go out and get.

This is bad news for the man we saw in Vancouver the other day holding a sign on a street corner admonishing people to accept Jesus as their saviour before it was too late. Not only is rapture a process, but it happened for me this morning three days ahead of schedule. It really began as Zeus and I watched a moose climb the ridge north of us, and then continued when I discovered the delicate beauty of wild crocuses in bloom near the summit. It reached euphoric proportions as I sat for a few moments enjoying the snow covered peaks surrounding me on all sides, and continued as I photographed a Columbia ground squirrel guarding its den while chirping a warning about our continued presence to its nearby comrades who had already run to the safety of theirs.

Rapture is a reasonably frequent experience, or can be. I’m hopeful wherever we are on May 21st, we’ll experience it again. All I can say for sure is if you’re spending your time watching your calendar waiting for Jesus, or any other event, real or imagined, it’s unlikely you’ll ever experience it at all.

An additional post regarding the return of the rain on May 19th will be forthcoming. This blog-post is being submitted from Medicine Hat, Alberta.

You can't control the weather

The last two days have largely been spent in the car. The weather left us with a choice between camping in the rain, or driving east and making up some for our slow departure from Vancouver Island. As a result, there's not much to report.

We are taking the scenic route through southern British Columbia. Our plan is to stick to route 3, also known as the "Crowsnest Highway" until it ends in Medicine Hat, Alberta. In spite of spending most of our time in the car, we've actually seen a fair bit of wildlife. Chris spotted a black bear eating something in the ditch right off the highway, a coyote ran across the road not far in front of our car, and we've seen a fair amount of caribou and deer as well.

After leaving Anderson Beach, our first stop was in Princeton where we got a motel room, watched Vancouver win game one in NHL Western Conference Finals, and tried to locate some good potential camping spots for the nights ahead. Our intent, as always, is to find a good spot and set up camp for at least a couple of nights. Unfortunately, the camping spot on Monroe Lake identified on a website as an excellent free place to camp was neither free nor a camping site. It was a day use picnic area.

The Monroe Lake site was located just up the road from Moyie Lake Provincial Park. So, late last night we pulled into the park's almost completely empty campground and spent the night there. This morning we are in Cranbrook, BC doing our laundry, blogging, and researching future potential campsites in hopes we can finally catch a break from the weather and enjoy a couple of sunny days somewhere in the shadow of the Canadian Rockies. It looks as though we are gunning for Hartley Lake just outside of Fernie, BC, but don't be surprised if we end up reporting we stayed somewhere else in a couple of days. Not knowing for sure where we're going to end up is a large part of the appeal.

Sorry, no pictures this time around. Moyie Lake was mostly lodgepole pine, white tailed deer, and squirrels. Besides squeaking and groaning in the breeze all night like a rusty hinge, the lodgepole pine monoculture landscape of the campground had no real significant qualities, photographic or otherwise. Moyie Lake itself was high, the waves nearly reaching the picnic tables along the shore. The sky above it was slate grey, threatening even more rain when we went to bed. But there is sun in Cranbrook at the moment, and we are daring to allow ourselves some cautious optimism about our next stop. Keep your fingers crossed.

A few pictures from our time on the Sqaumish River

Anderson Beach – Squamish River, BC

The following post reflects the thoughts and experiences from our stay on Anderson Beach along the Squamish River from the night of May 12 through the morning of May 15th. An additional post is provided following this one containing some of the many photographs taken during our stay in this beautiful area.

Friday the 13th is our lucky day. It took us a little while, but we found Anderson Beach at about 5:00 PM yesterday (May 12th). There is only a small group of school kids on the other end of the beach, and they are leaving as I write. For the moment at least, there is the hope Chris, Zeus, and I will have the place to ourselves for a couple of days. It is certainly remote enough for that hope to become a reality.

Backed by trees and shrubs, our camp is located at the top of the beach far from the riverbank. The sandy opening we have chosen provides us with plenty of sun and room for a nice fire, easily built from the abundant driftwood deposited against old sand bars and lodged against stands of still young cottonwood and alder. Between our tent and the fact we are using our tarp for the first time, we feel right at home.

The Squamish River runs through a deep, glacially scoured canyon. The mountains on either side are still covered with snow. Through the binoculars, the peaks some 1,000-1,500 metres above us are still capped with deep cornices several metres thick in their own right. Up river from our campsite, on the west side of the canyon, a waterfall pours over a cliff just below the snowline, giving us the sense we are living in a scene from Lord of The Rings.

We experienced a few drops of rain last night, but the coals of our campfire were still hot enough this morning that merely rearranging the unburned wood on top of them and awaiting a gentle breeze was enough to bring our fire to life. Now, as noon approaches, the sun is warming my shirtless back and all traces of the clouds that were passing like smoke above the trees this morning are gone.

3:45 PM

At last, a touch of pink from a mild sunburn!! We can only speculate as to the temperature, but since we are seeking shade, we assume it must be somewhere between 22 and 25 degrees. I spent the better part of the afternoon so far walking barefoot over the sand mostly dark, damp, and warm sand above a small diversion of the river. It felt good to take each step with nothing between me and the earth.

Wildlife has been scarce so far; the prints of a racoon, a bald eagle circling too far away for a good picture, common golden eye swimming and diving in a sheltered pool along the river, a butterfly, amphibian eggs strung out along a sandbank, warblers, chickadees, robins, and, of course, the ever present crow. This spring has been cooler and wetter than usual, so perhaps, like most of us, the local wildlife is waiting for a few more days like today before coming to Anderson Beach.

May 14th

It rained a little more last night. We will be interested to learn if any of us can get to sleep after this trip is over without first hearing the sound of rain against the tent at night. It’s still overcast this morning. None-the-less, it is warm enough to climb out of the tent without having to put shoes or a jacket on first, and this is an improvement over our initial camping experiences on Vancouver Island.

I was reminded this morning of the intelligence of crows. As we awoke, there was one right outside our tent looking to take advantage of any food we had carelessly left out. Yesterday, I poured a bowl of dog food for Zeus and left the bag next to his dish, rolling the top up to loosely seal it. One of the resident crows must have seen me feeding Zeus. Almost as soon as Zeus was done eating a crow flew down, opened the bag, and began to help itself to some dinner. None of us witnessed the opening of the bag, but it had obviously accomplished the feat fairly quickly. The crow only got a couple of pieces at most, as it was nowhere near as quiet as it was skilful.

In this age of mass extinction, we have come to generally think primarily of rare species. Rare species that also happen to be incredibly intelligent, like whales, hold even greater fascination for us. We forget that even when extinction was creeping along at its normal background rate, nature was full of countless rarities. In fact, the variety of relatively rare life forms is much greater than the variety of common ones. Intelligence has nothing to do with frequency, as evidenced by the smarts of the common crow and the stupidity of the species responsible for Earth’s latest mass extinction.

Farewell to a wonderful companion

They are alive and well somewhere,
The smallest sprout shows there is really no death,
And if ever there was it led forward life, and does not wait
at the end to arrest it,
And ceas'd the moment life appear'd. - Walt Whitman

Isis will no longer be joining us on this trip. The above picture was taken just minutes before we last saw her on Sunday as she enjoyed a few moments of sun on the picnic table while we packed the car.

Isis loved our last camping spot. The woods provided unending opportunities to hide and play. So it was no surprise, really, that she should hide about the time we were finished packing the car for the short drive into town where we had a motel room reserved. Still, when we started the car in hopes that would bring her out as it had before, she appeared a metre or two into the bed of ferns behind camp meowing at us. When I went to pick her up, she ran a few metres further in, clearly enjoying the chase I was foolishly willing to indulge in. It's impossible to beat a cat at such games, especially when scrambling over logs and trying to avoid hidden holes beneath a thick mat of greenery.

Giving up, I left to check us into our room and unload the car while Chris and Zeus stayed behind to see if she would come out again. She never did. We spoke with Vinnie, the camp host, and he agreed to keep an eye open for her. After returning again yesterday morning we spent a couple of more hours calling for her and beating the bushes, but to no avail. We left the cat carrier and some food with Vinnie, along with a number he can reach us if she should turn up. Vinnie has two cats of his own, so we know if she does appear, she'll be well taken care of until our return. All three of us miss her and were excited to see how well she seemed to be adapting to life on the road. Perhaps she adapted a bit too well. Regardless, she will be travelling in our hearts with us across Canada, so the name of the blog will not change, at least not for now. Farewell Isis.

Rain, roof racks, and frustration

In "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" Robert Pirsig reminds us "When you want to hurry something, that means you no longer care about it and want to get on to other things." The second half of our first week on the road has had more than its share of hurrying and wanting to "get on to other things."

As we packed to leave Pedder Bay, it became apparent we still had far too much to practically travel very far. The back seat left precious little space for the dog and Isis was condemned to travelling on Chris' lap without so much as a crack or crevice to call her own. So, when Chris suggested we buy a roof rack, it didn't take much to convince me this was a good idea.

But first, we needed to locate a place to stay for the next few days. Lake Cowichan, our goal for the next leg of our journey, was about two hours drive from Pedder Bay. There were at least three BC Forest Service campsites on the map, and after listening to Zeus complain over my shoulder for the better part of the trip about the few square feet he had been allocated between the cooler, the cat carrier, and the door any campsite was welcome.

Unfortunately, none of the BC Forest Service sites were open for the season yet. However, we located a small campground within an island of trees in a sea of clearcuts along the dirt road running down the south shore of the lake. Operated by TimberWest and going by the name Caycuse, it was practically vacant. The campground host, his wife, five children, two dogs, and two cats made up well over 50% of the camp's population. The host went by the name of Vinnie and could best be described as Canada's version of a survivalist. While more liberal than your typical American survivalist, he was none the less preoccupied with the coming end of the world projected by the Mayan calendar to take place sometime in the next year or two.

It started raining the morning after our arrival, and it hardly stopped for two days. Isis did her disappearing act again. As she had done at Pedder Bay before, she took a day to explore the new surroundings. This time, though, the forest was right outside the tent providing a thick carpet of fern and fallen trees with endless cavities and natural tunnels through which to explore without being seen or heard from. The tiny masked shrews running about in camp would have made an easy catch for her as well, since I was able to touch them without getting much of a reaction other than a quick sniff to determine whether or not I was an edible grub.

We figured the rain provided an opportunity to drive into Duncan about 55 kilometres away to find that roof rack we had talked about, and pick up a couple of other things we needed. And it was here that I found myself beginning to become impatient with our journey so far. Not a good sign when less than a week out. Upon our return to the campsite I initially resolved to wait for the rain to break before attempting to install anything, but out of boredom I took to it shortly after we got back. I studied the instructions carefully, all too aware of my track record with do-it-yourself projects. It seemed straight forward enough, but from the start nothing went right. What the instructions said only needed to be loosened to attach I couldn't fit on without removing, and once on it couldn't be reattached. In fact, one bracket wouldn't fit over the intended post whether attached or not. After more than a few four letter words, rereading the instructions several more times, and throwing a few things, the project was abandoned until Chris and I worked on it together the next day confirming the rack must have been designed for some other 2000 Jetta model we were not aware of, as it clearly couldn't possibly fit on ours.

A similar story could be told of the logs we purchased from Vinnie in hopes of having a campfire. The constant rain and accompanying high humidity meant even wood kept dry beneath a tarp took an unusual amount of work to turn into a self sustained fire. Using the hand pump normally reserved for blowing up our air mattress as a bellows, for four hours on the morning of day two I produced an incredible amount of smoke, but little fire. The pump would fan the coals into an intense flame, only to quickly die within seconds if I stopped pumping. It wasn't until our final night, with some help from a break in the weather, I was able to carefully and slowly construct a campfire over the course of an hour or two. Once it finally reached sufficient intensity to keep burning on its own with just an occasional log thrown on to keep things going, I grew it as quickly as I could within the confines of the metal fire ring, making sure not one of the hemlock logs we had purchased from Vinnie went to waste.

All that rain, driving back and forth between Duncan and our campsite to pick up a roof rack, then return a roof rack and ultimately order another roof rack, had me not only physically going in circles, but mentally going in circles as well. It took my wife Chris, with her incredible ability to listen and reflect, to bring me back to what this trip was about. In addition to travelling while we work on and wait for our work permits, we are trying to live differently. Every time I start to rush things, I stop caring about them and miss the beauty that is all around us. To quote Robert Pirsig again "That is what caring really is, a feeling of identification with what one's doing. When one has this feeling then he also sees the inverse side of caring, Quality itself." What better time to be reminded of this than the beginning of the journey?

Happy Cinco de Mayo from Pedder Bay

Happy Cinco de Mayo everyone! It is remarkable we even remembered the Mexican holiday upon waking up this morning, since there is nothing about either our surroundings or the weather that would remotely remind anyone of Mexico.
After a couple of games of cribbage, Chris and I went to bed early last night. We were awakened a few times by the wind and rain, but the fact we were all able to get back to sleep is a sign we are adapting well to camping. This morning is cool and mostly grey, but bird song is everywhere and the vultures are circling just west of camp, so everything appears normal from our perspective.
We'll be breaking camp later today and moving east to the Lake Cowichan area. At least that is where we hope to end up. This will put us out of both cell and internet range, but we intend to be back in touch with the rest of the world by Mother's Day.
Zeus and Isis, the yin and yang of this adventure, are both doing well. Zeus is very much in the moment; spontaneous and yet predictable at the same time, if that is possible. He is slowly figuring out every person he sees does not need to be greeted with loud barking, but will never learn every stick isn't a game of fetch waiting to happen.
Isis, on the other hand, has reacted fairly calmly. When we first moved to Canada, the cab of our U-Haul became a miasma of white and grey fir, the product of stress related shedding. There is no indication Isis' first camping trip is producing a similar reaction. She has retained a calmness and rationality Zeus generally lacks. Each venture into the tall grass and Scotch broom lining the back of our campsite is slow and deliberate, with an occasional short "meow" indicating she is near, even if she has made herself invisible in the thick vegetation. We shall see what the next campsite has in store for us.

Our first 2 days at Pedder Bay: rain, establishing a routine, and learning to leave things alone

A journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step, and much more. It's been about two and one half days since we finally got everything out of our apartment. Since then, we spent the first day in our tent listening to the rain beat against the roof, wondering where our cat Isis disappeared to after deciding the motion of the tent's walls in the wind was too much for her to bear, and then today finally taking advantage of some blue sky and sunshine to consolidate or dispose of more of our stuff so we can actually travel in our car without having to shuttle things from campsite to campsite. Having crammed everything we can into storage or lavished mountains of stuff on Victoria's thrift stores, we are finally down to a manageable minimum.

Henry David Thoreau said "A man is rich in proportion to the number of things he can afford to let alone." This past year has convinced us he was right. We began our Canadian adventure trying to leave everything alone except what we could fit into a 17 foot long U-Haul truck. Preparations for this trip have us putting everything we can into a 14' X 4' storage unit, bringing with us only a trunk full of camping supplies along with our dog Zeus and cat Isis in the back seat of our Jetta. If ever we needed convincing George W. Bush's "ownership society" was really a pitch for slavery, mission accomplished.

We'll be making this up as we go - both the journey and the blog. We call our blog "Travelling with Zeus and Isis" because their vastly different personalities and approaches to life will, we hope, be a source of insight and inspiration along the way. Regardless, besides each other they're the only family my wife Chris and I are bringing along. Isis is currently off on escapade #2 in the woods, after being found nearby in a forest clearing some 20 hours after first disappearing to escape the movable walls of our new home. However, having found her the first time, we now feel fairly confident she'll turn up again and will still be joining us on the trip.

Our opening days are being spent at Pedder Bay on the southern tip of Vancouver Island just down the road from our old apartment in Metchosin, BC. Here we will take as much time as we need to establish a routine, relax, and take care of last minute details we had put off or forgotten during the hectic days leading up to our departure. We wouldn't mind making it all the way across Canada to see the tide retreat and return at the Bay of Fundy, but this is about the journey, not a particular destination. We hope our friends and family enjoy this blog. We encourage comments. Campsite suggestions or simple camping recipes are especially welcome. Until next time!