The Northern Lights
The whole world, it seems, was caught up with the light show happening in the skies above two nights ago, thanks to a geomagnetic storm on our nearest star. I myself jumped on the bandwagon and took a walk down to the beach around 11 p.m. to see what I could see.
To be honest? I was a little disappointed. As soon as I stepped out into my street, I looked up and saw a green haze overhead, visible even with all the light pollution generated in my neighbourhood, one of the most densely-populated postal codes in all of Canada. Down by the water, where it’s much darker, I could see that the haze was definitely aurora borealis, but it was faint. I set up my tiny camera on my tiny tripod, balanced it on a beach log, and tried a variety of exposures. This photo, taken with a 30-second exposure, was the best of the lot. The only editing I did was some cropping. That pink you see? Not visible to the naked eye. It only comes through with the long exposure.
Some years ago, I was travelling from Nanaimo to Vancouver late at night, and spent most of the ferry trip on the outer deck in the dark, watching a vivid display of dancing emerald green over the North Shore mountains. At the time, I didn’t know what I was looking at, but later realized it must have been the Northern Lights I had witnessed.
I didn’t know what I was looking at because it’s rare to see the Northern Lights this far south. In Alberta, they were almost routine. I remember many a winter’s night in Edmonton seeing white streaks of light in the sky like will-o’-wisps as I went about my evening.
The most spectacular Northern Lights’ display I’ve ever seen, and my first time seeing them in colour, was one summer while camping in northern Alberta with my sister and a friend. This was the same friend I had trained around Europe with the year before, and she and I started reminiscing about our travels as we sat around the campfire. My sister had long gone to bed when we noticed the Northern Lights above us. The mesmerizing dance of pink and green was unlike anything I’d ever seen.
I was kinda hoping for the same the other night. My suspicions are that the light pollution of downtown Vancouver interfered with my experience.
Even so, we got lucky this weekend with summer-like temperatures, so it didn’t take much effort to step out for a quick stroll before bed, and share an amazing other-worldly experience with dozens of strangers doing the same.
Danger: Thin Ice
We had our week of winter this past week and we got it all: polar vortex, Arctic outflow, and 28 centimetres of snow.
That’s the most snow we’ve had in one go since 1996, but the sad reality is any amount of snow pretty much shuts down the city and makes the national news.
And the rest of Canada laughs.
The sustained colder temperatures made for some thin ice conditions. This is Lost Lagoon. And yes, the kids were playing pond hockey at the other end of the lagoon the day before the snow fell. I like my ice a little thicker, but I’m sure it made for some lasting memories for those kids who did get out on the ice.
Merry Christmas!
Burrard Street, Vancouver
Lights at Lafarge
There used to be a lovely light display in English Bay every winter. An orca, a heron, a tree. Also a bear and a beaver that I never got around to photographing.
But those beautiful lights did not come back last year, nor this year. I don’t know why they’re gone, but I sure do miss them.
Last year, feeling bereft, I went looking for an alternative light display. I found one, all the way out in Coquitlam. Lights at Lafarge is the largest free outdoor holiday light display in Metro Vancouver and is held every year at Lafarge Lake, a small pond created from an old quarry.
I convinced two friends to join me and one evening we rode the Skytrain all the way to the end of the line. The lake and its light display are located next to the station.
The trail forms a loop just over a kilometre long. Its flat and paved surface means it is both wheelchair- and stroller-friendly.
I didn’t get myself organized in time to post these photos last year, so I’m posting them for this month’s season of light. Although taking the Skytrain all the way to Coquitlam is a bit of a trek compared to walking down the street to my beach, Lights at Lafarge is definitely worth the trip.
Through My Lens: Golden Maple on Lost Lagoon
It’s been a while since I’ve posted a photo of our fall colours. And so, here’s one that I took a couple of weeks ago.
My West End
Last August, I had my cat-sitters over one evening for a picnic dinner to thank them for watching over my fur babies while I was away in Alberta. As soon as they arrived, we gathered up the dinner and some beach blankets and headed to the end of my street.
The end of my street is a grassy, treed spot between two beaches, never crowded but with a perfect view of the sunset. As a backyard, it’s great — even though I share it with the entire neighbourhood. At one point during the evening, I looked around at the dozens of people enjoying their own picnics, and marvelled at how much I love where I live, and that, even after living here for a quarter of a century, I have yet to tire of it.
Yup, you read that right. Twenty-five years ago today, I moved into my first apartment in the West End. And as long as I’ve been writing and posting on this blog, I’ve been sharing photos and stories about my home. It’s why I called the blog There and Back Again.
Because I always come back.
In honour of this momentous anniversary, here are some of my favourite, previously unposted, photos of my West End.
Through My Lens: English Bay Paddlers
When you live by English Bay, you never know what you’ll see on the water. Thanks to the power of my camera’s zoom lens, I was able to get this shot early yesterday morning.
Coulees Along the Crowsnest
I was in Alberta last month to visit family, and one evening I took a bus from Calgary to Lethbridge — a journey I haven’t made in a very long time. I took this photo of the coulees as we drove along the Crowsnest Highway. I just love this landscape.
The coulees are ravines that formed when the glaciers retreated after the last Ice Age. Wind and water gave them their characteristic V-shape. They are everywhere in southern Alberta, but are especially prevalent along the Oldman River that flows through the middle of Lethbridge.
Coulee evolved from the French-Canadian word coulée, which in turn evolved from the French word couler, which means “to flow.”
Salish Eagle
My latest BC Ferry ride — and my third of the summer — was on this boat, the Salish Eagle, which took me to and from Galiano Island just over a month ago.
Three of these Salish-Class vessels came into service in 2017 and a fourth one last year. Built in Gdańsk, Poland, they are the first ships in BC Ferries’ fleet to run on liquefied natural gas, thereby reducing their emissions. Compact compared to the bigger boats that sail between Vancouver and Vancouver Island, the Salish-Class vessels go to and from the Southern Gulf Islands and between the Sunshine Coast and Vancouver Island. They carry up to 600 passengers and crew and 138 cars, and I absolutely love sailing on them.
Each Salish-Class vessel has original Coast Salish artwork adorning its interiors and exteriors. John Marston of the Stz’uminus First Nation is the one who designed the artwork you see on the Salish Eagle.
Little Qualicum Falls
There’s a gem of a campground on Vancouver Island I’ve been going to since forever. It’s called Little Qualicum Falls, and a family weekend there at the beginning of June was my second BC ferry trip of the summer.
Qualicum, or Quallchum, means “where the dog salmon run.” Dog salmon (also known as chum) is one of the five major species of the BC salmon fishery.
We lucked out with absolute picture-perfect weather for our Qualicum weekend, which we were all incredibly grateful for. A year ago, we were in the thick of a more typical Juneuary and our plans to go to Qualicum were scuttled before we even got into the car.
The provincial park sits alongside the Little Qualicum River and around Cameron Lake. It’s a great family campground with lots of trails to explore, lots of swimming holes to jump into, and then, of course, there are the falls.
As we often do, we took a quick side trip to Cathedral Grove on our last day before turning around to head to the ferry. Driving along Highway 4, we noticed a helicopter with a heli-bucket scooping water up from Cameron Lake. We rounded a bend in the road, and then we saw it — the wildfire on top of one of the mountains along the highway.
It was a small one, but it grew, as wildfires do, and a day or two later, that same highway we had driven on was closed for two weeks, completely shutting off the coastal communities of western Vancouver Island from the rest of the province. A detour over logging roads was put in place, but it was a rough route and not recommended for tourist traffic.
The highway reopened once the wildfire was no longer burning, but assessments of the mountain slopes above the highway have deemed them unstable. And so, beginning Monday, Highway 4 will be closed for most of the day between 9 and 5 to allow crews to do rock scaling above the highway. They figure the work will take at least a month, which is really going to mess up the tourist season for Tofino and Ucluelet.
I’m glad we got our Island weekend, but I feel for all those whose summer plans are being thwarted by a wildfire that has long been put out.
There and Back Again 