Stuck at the Bottom of a Canadian Hill

Monday, June 27th – Victoria to Port Alberni, British Columbia - Day 136

We woke up early to pack up the trailer to hit the ferry, then pulled a full 180 degree turn and decided to see if Mary could take the bus to the train station. Gen drove her to the bus station in downtown Victoria and was just in time to buy a ticket on a bus ride that delivers you directly to the train station, no fuss, no muss.

We decided we needed to explore the island and with much help from James, Matthew’s brother/Gen’s cousin, plotted a route along the coast of South-West Vancouver Island, across the island to Nanaimo and then back across the island to Pacific Rim National Park and Tofino. We packed up the trailer and with much love for our gracious hosts, Patrick, Leila, Matthew, Paolina and James, hit the road. Before we left, Pat and Leila, and their friends Dave and Deb, invited us to join them at Dave and Deb’s chalet in Whistler in a few days. We weren’t planning to go to Whistler, but we decided we’d take them up on the invite.

Before we left Victoria, Gen had heard about our Mount Douglas experience and wanted to go as well. We drove the trailer up the steep grades, parked and walked up to the peak. The view of the ocean, mountains and the islands around Vancouver Island were spectacular.

After we passed Sooke on the south-west coast of Victoria, we reached the first of our recommended destinations, Mystic Beach. The road down was a very rough gravel road. We thought it looked like we would get stuck at the bottom, we didn’t even bother taking a closer look.

The next stop was Sombrio Beach. The road looked good, not too steep or rocky. We even asked a few people hanging out at the top of the road if the road was good for a trailer; they said, “Good road, no problems”. As we started moving down the road it got worse and worse. Halfway down, Gen asked me if I thought we would get back up, I was optimistic at the time.

We arrived at the parking lot and took a trail downhill to a fork in the trail. Gen had gone right to a suspension bridge, unknowingly Jo-Ce, Charlotte and me went the other way to a beautiful rocky beach. We corrected our mistake and met Gen for lunch on a rocky creek bed under a suspension bridge. The hill up was tougher than the way down.

To be continued...

Comments

A Desert Forest

Saturday, May 28th – Joshua Tree National Park - North to Joshua Tree National Park - South, California– Day 107 Our campsite was a large open dirt area with some scrub around the outside. In the dark we had managed to park beside the pile of horse poo and shaving. Horses were allowed in this site. Gen stepped in the middle of a pile. The Joshua Tree National Park visitor centre was a five-minute drive away. The town of Joshua Tree was packed with college age millennials communing with nature. There was a market with kombucha, organic greens and a few small tortoises. It was all very pleasant but very busy. The laundromat was at the edge of the market, I charged the devices and did the laundry. Gen bought some produce from a guy loading a truck. I even snuck in to buy some watermelon kombucha. The drive into the park was ten minutes followed by a ten-minute line to show our pass. A quick stop to fill up our water bottles and we were into the park. The amazing thing abo

Canyonlands is Another Planet - Pt 3

Thursday, May 12th – Moab, Utah – Day 91 Our day was shortening already, our next hike, the Grand View Overlook was closed due to a search and rescue operation. Apparently, falls and accidents happen quite a bit at National Parks; Gen looked up the top ten most dangerous parks and Canyonlands wasn’t there (it was number 12). We got a recommendation to hike the White Rim Overlook trail, a 0.9-mile easy hike. The kids were running out of energy. They made it most of the way and then decided to stop to climb a rock. Gen and I continued the short distance to the canyon edge to see the sights. Canyon after canyon after canyon was what we saw. We stopped to sit and marvel at the scenery as the shadows started to lengthen. On our drive back, we saw the sun set and we stopped at the visitor centre one more time to see the view from just across the road. I couldn’t get enough canyons; I was in love with the park and w

A Desert Forest - Part 4

We finally decided to move to our last destination before the sun set. The Arch Rock Nature trail was next. We reached the parking lot and saw the rocks in the distance, we were debating what we wanted to do. We just started moving and once we did, we found ourselves racing down the trail to the rocks. The kids wanted to play monster and once they started running, everyone else was running as well. We had another poo-mergency with no restroom in sight, the evidence is buried in the desert. There was more climbing on the rocks. We took pictures of the sun setting and took a quick look at the Arch rock before starting back to the car. Gen was behind the wheel, an hour later we were leaving the park’s south entrance. We stopped at the Ranger station to freshen up in the bathroom and fill our water bottles before heading to our campsite. Luckily, the site was the overflow campsite for the park so was minutes from the outside of the park. We

Simnett Travels

Search This Blog