A matter of perspective?

From the port of Calais in France, on a good day you can see the white cliffs of Dover - some 20 miles away on the English coastline. The cliffs rise to about 100 metres above sea level and they appear as a thin strip of white rockface just above the horizon.

From my garden on Gabriola Island, most days I can see the Sunshine Coast on the BC mainland - also about 20 miles away across the Strait of Georgia. The difference here is that the mountains along the coastline make it seem so much closer - and I still find it difficult to believe that they really are 20 miles away. The difference, of course, is that the mountains in that part of BC rise to more than 1,400 metres - and therefore, despite the distance across the Strait, they are so much more prominent than the English coastline is from France.

Like the English Channel, the Strait of Georgia is crossed by numerous car ferries - with the route from Nanaimo to Tsawwassen passing close along the coastline of Gabriola, seemingly little more than a mile (but in reality probably two miles) from the shoreline near our house. A second ferry route from Nanaimo takes a more northerly route to Horseshoe Bay in West Vancouver - and from our window these ferries are also visible on the horizon, giving the impression that, as they pass through our field of vision, they are already close to the BC mainland.

In truth (as confirmed by the GPS tracking on the BC Ferries website) at the time that they are visible to us, these ferries are only half way across the Strait and probably still 10 miles from the distant BC coastline - so as they disappear from view they are not, as I had imagined, entering the approaches to Horseshoe Bay but merely disappearing over the horizon.

Erroneously, I had assumed that my view of the mainland took in the mountains and their lower slopes running right down to the coast. If that was the case, then I would be expect to be able to see the many cruise ships that pass along the BC coast en route from Vancouver to Alaska at this time of year - but I don't, as they are (I assume) also below my horizon.

From my vantage point on Gabriola, I am only about 25 metres above sea level. If I can't see the coastline of mainland BC, then where does my view of the Sunshine Coast actually start - 50 metres above sea level? 100 metres? 200 metres?

Now, if only I had become a scientist......

If only every airline treated you like this.....

"Good morning, can I have your second name please? Ah yes, John. How are you today? I have your reservation for the 8.20 departure. Do you have any luggage today? Can we carry it to the aircraft for you? And you're returning at 17.40 - is that correct? Okay... all I need now is some photo id. That's great - here's your boarding card. Just take a seat for a few minutes, we'll be boarding shortly.... please help yourself to coffee and cookies while you wait"

There's a range of complimentary newspapers in the departure lounge too... and the cookies are really good. Boarding card in hand, I settle down with the morning news and a coffee. Meanwhile, the baggage for the 8.20 flight is placed into a trolley and taken to the aircraft for loading. Suitcases, briefcases and laptops.... specially labelled to ensure they are loaded with care.

Pretty soon, the check-in clerk calls passengers for the 8.20 flight to follow her to Gate 2, where the plane is ready for boarding. Boarding cards are collected and the captain walks ahead of us to his aircraft (nice touch) welcoming everyone aboard and making sure we're all safely seated and belted in.

"There are 5 exits on this aircraft - two at the front; two at the back and one in the roof. Life jackets are under your seats. Sit back and enjoy you're flight,we'll be downtown in about 20 minutes." The captain checks the cabin doors are closed and climbs into the cockpit next to his co-pilot. The engine bursts into life and he leans out the door to check that the aircraft is untied and ready to go.

The runway's got a few ripples on it today.... which is probably not surprising as we're in Nanaimo harbour on a Harbour Air 14 seat Turbine Single Otter floatplane and following in the wake (literally) of it's two-engined brother, the Twin Otter, favoured by West Coast Air on this route for its extra seats and higher cruising speed.

Harbour Air has grown from 2 aircraft in 1982 to more than 30 today, and prides itself on offering a professional service to its customers. The deHavilland Turbine Otter last came off the production line in the early 1960's - yet the fleet is immaculately turned out and only the view into the cockpit reveals the true age of the aircraft.

With a short burst of power we're airborne - and flying over Entrance Island lighthouse before striking out across the Strait of Georgia towards Vancouver. Very soon, we're flying around Vancouver's English Bay and over Stanley Park before dipping down into the Burrard Inlet and coasting in to a smooth landing alongside Canada Place. Greeted by the ground crew, our aircraft is safely tied up and the captain welcomes us to Vancouver.

Everything about Harbour Air's service is indeed professional - and what a way to arrive at a transportation conference - just ten minutes walk from the terminal!

Mystery solved!

Over the past couple of weeks, we've noticed the bird feeder has been raided most evenings - and a couple of times we've caught sight of the culprit.

Tonight, he finally posed for the camera, enjoying a stale blueberry muffin and a mixed salad! Raccoons are noted for raiding dustbins - but some are less shy than others!

Big Bike back in Nanaimo

The Harbour City Star reports.....

The Heart and Stroke Big Bike is peddling back to Nanaimo, and it's looking for new riders.

In 2008, Big Bike riders in Nanaimo raised more than $44,000.00 to fund groundbreaking heart and stroke research. This year they hope to do even better, with a goal of raising $7 million across Canada.

Big Bike is a bicycle built for 30 that travels across Canada from April to September. It will be making its way along high-profile routes through more than 200 communities across nine provinces. Measuring eight feet across at the wheels and extending 30 feet long, it's a sight you won't soon forget.
Join a Big Bike team, or start your own, and help pedal our monster bike across Canada.

Each team has up to 29 enthusiastic riders, and one driver provided by the Heart and Stroke Foundation, who leads them on a fun-filled 15- to 20-minute ride.
Nanaimo ride dates are June 4 at Port Place Mall and June 5 at Woodgrove Centre. To register or for more information, contact the Nanaimo Area Office at 250-754-5274 or visit http://www.bigbike.ca/

Watch the Big Bike video here!

Star Wars - high and dry

High tide at Whalebone Beach

Through the hollow log shaped window......

Only the brave.......

Calm waters.......

A nation without plaster

Canada is advanced in many ways - but now and again the odd idiosyncracy shines through. I first came across this when debating lumber sizes (note to Brits: it's lumber, not timber) and realised that I was conversing with people who never bought an 8'x4' sheet of plywood, or a length of 4"x2" timber (sorry, lumber) to frame a wall. "You mean 4x8 and 2x4 - round here it's always the smaller measure first" Six months in, and I'm starting to get the idea.

Next is the idea that a 2"x 4" measure actually means 1.5"x 3.5" - and even for rough framing, the lumber is never the size you expect it to be. However, a 4' x 8' sheet of 3/4" plywood is just that, 4' wide, 8' long and 3/4" thick. And everything is sold in standard (note to Brits : standard=imperial, unless you're talking about a car gearbox when standard=manual) lengths - 8', 10', 12' and so on.

Nothing unusual about that of course, except that as a nation, Canada adopted metric distances on its roads many years ago (to be different from the USA, so they say) and food is sold in grammes and kilogrammes. Except mushrooms. Yesterday I bought half a pound of mushrooms.

Back to the building lark. Plasterboard comes in 4' x 8' sheets, and it's drywall, not plasterboard. Why? Because there is no plaster. Back home, plasterboard is covered with a skim of finishing plaster to seal the surface and make it ready for paining or papering. Oh no. Drywall goes up, the joints get taped, screwheads filled and filling compound is feathered in and sanded down to ensure a smooth surface with the drywall panel. Hmm... this sounds like a shortcut to me. When you tape over joints and then apply filling compound, the surface will be higher than the surrounding wall area, won't it? Yep. So you apply some more compound, spread it out further and by the time you've finished, you've plastered the whole wall with polyfilla! The difference is, it then has to be sanded down again (cough!) to get a surface ready for painting.

So, on to the plumbing. It's inches again, not millimetres. I've spent the past 20 years adapting old 1/2" pipework in the UK to 15mm metric, and here I am going back again. Ho hum. It's a good thing it's only 5 km (note to Brits: 3 miles) to the building supplies shop.

Back there, we take our cars across the water to Europe and the clever cars can change from miles per hour to kilometres per hour at the flick of a switch. Same here, of course - so that when you drive across the border to the US, you can switch back to miles. US miles are, by the way, the same as UK miles..... so why is a US gallon only 0.83 of an imperial gallon? So that it converts readily to litres of course (not...) at just 3.79 litres to the gallon instead of the 4.54 litres that we have to buy in the UK to fill a gallon can. So, in the US, petrol (sorry, gas) is sold at a price which relates to 0.83 of a proper gallon, or 3.79 metric litres. Simple eh?

Well, just to confuse the Americans, Canada sells its gas by the litre (so they can convert it readily back to US gallons by multiplying by 0.26417205235814844), whereas back in the UK we buy our fuel in litres and simply multiply by 0.2199736031676198 to get it back to gallons. Why do we convert it back to gallons? It's obvious - it's so we can measure our fuel consumption in miles per gallon!

Canadians have grown out of that, naturally, and instead have adopted the European standard of measuring fuel consumption in litres per 100km. So, a Ford Explorer sells in Canada with a fuel consumption on city roads of 16.2 litres per 100km. Ouch! That's only 17.4 miles to the gallon in town. Unless you're in the USA, then it's just 15 miles to the gallon. No wonder they're called gas guzzlers.

All this became clear when I bought my 2003 Ford Windstar in March. Like most Fords, the Windstar will keep going for ever in a country that doesn't have an annual MOT test to pass. There were dozens of Windstars on the market with a quarter of a million kilometres on the clock (note to Brits: that's 155,230 miles) but, not surprisingly, they are starting to get a bit tired by then. So how do you ask for a car that's covered fewer kilometres in Canada? You insist on a low mileage model of course, what else?

I'm confused. Oh well, it must be an age thing.

Back on the island

Today started around 5 am when my body was telling me I really should be out of bed and eating lunch. The journey from England had gone well - apart from the fact that a wheel on my bag had collapsed about 50 yards from closing my front door and having dragged it to the station, one wheel was round and the other very definitely not.

Too late to worry about minor technical problems; it would have to be carried onto the underground anyway in London and it would be good practice for my arrival in Canada.

Air Transat (or Air Transh*t as Emma would say) was punctual, if a little spartan, and arrival at YVR went well, until the queue in the immigration hall blocked the bottom of the escalators. Almost an hour later, the baggage was waiting on the carousel and I took the shuttle to the hotel.

The morning dawned to a bright blue sky and I decided to head back to the airport early for breakfast at Tim Horton's. I had an hour before the Nanaimo coach left and I sat there considering whether I really wanted to carry my bags across Nanaimo to the harbour. A phone call to Graham at the Silva Bay HQ of Tofino Air and I'd actioned Plan B, so it was down to the SeaAir terminal on the shuttle to prove to myself that a seaplane really could lift off with 4 people (and my luggage) on board. It did.

It's an interesting first time experience sitting behind the pilot on a 50(ish) year old DeHavilland Beaver, with the only acknowledgement to the 21st century being the GPS Navigation system by the front seat passenger's knees. The lever protruding from the floor next to the pilot's seat was not the handbrake or the seat adjuster, it controlled the flaps - with the throttle, propeller pitch and fuel mixture all controlled by sliding knobs reminiscent of the heater controls on a 1949 Ford Prefect. In fact, they may well have been the heater controls from a 1949 Ford Prefect. I never did quite work out what the red knob over the pilot's head was for, but it evidently needed regular tweaking throughout the flight.

As the engine spluttered into life we donned our ear protectors and taxied down the estuary to take off. The water below turned from a muddy brown to a deep blue as we approached the islands and 15 minutes later we were over Silva Bay. After a quick loop round the bay to check that the 2 or 3 sailboats on the move were not going to get in the way, we were brought in to a smooth landing in the marina.

Graham was waiting at Silva Bay terminal to take my money and he confirmed that he had the booking for Pete, Sally, Gav and Jess in June. There's no going back now, Sally! I think even Heidi may enjoy it.

All's well back on the island - the grass has grown madly of course, so that's where I'll be spending the afternoon. The car's still away visiting Richard, so I may see that later on!

Fancy a new boat?

If you're in the market for something just that little bit different, take a look at this "small ad" from BC Ferries:

THREE SURPLUS BC FERRIES FOR SALE!

With the decommissioning of the Queen of Prince Rupert from its fleet yesterday, BC Ferries announced that three surplus vessels are now currently for sale. The Queen of Vancouver, Queen of Saanich and Queen of Prince Rupert are all being offered for sale. The vessels range in age from 43 to 47 years old.

Last year, three new Coastal Class vessels joined the fleet. This year the MV Island Sky, an intermediate size ship entered service in February and the Northern Expedition, a 600-passenger northern ship will enter service next month. These new ships allow for the retirement of some of BC Ferries’ older vessels.

“These ships have served our passengers well for over four decades. We are pleased to welcome new state-of-the-art ships with enhanced customer amenities and modern technological and safety features to our fleet,” said David L. Hahn, BC Ferries’ President and CEO. “At the same time, we recognize the many years of outstanding service that were provided by the Queen of Vancouver, Queen of Saanich and Queen of Prince Rupert.”

BC Ferries is seeking expressions of interest from prospective buyers. Market demand will dictate the price. Prospective buyers should contact BC Ferries immediately at shipsforsale@bcferries.com.

Advertising rules, ok?

When I'm away from Gabriola, I check the web most days to see what's happening around BC. After watching the recent TV documentary about the impending Tsunami, it's good for reassuring me that my island home will still be there when I get back!

This morning, a headline in the Nanaimo Daily News caught my eye. "Surrey woman likely killed by laptop". Ouch! How could this happen? Read further and it appears that the poor lady has been in a road collision and her own laptop has struck her head - with fatal consequences.

Sensitively reported by the Nanaimo Daily News, it's a pity that their webmaster wasn't a little more sensitive in selecting the on-line advertising to accompany the article. Follow the storyline.....