Scenic Sunday - Can Cows Swim?

Today I spent a glorious few hours at Cattle Point. It's probably one of my favourite local haunts. It's beautiful and, for a city park, very peaceful ... in terms of human noise, I mean. Crows, ravens and seagulls bark at each other constantly but when you're by the ocean, and not in bed trying to sleep, they sound great.



So, Cattle Point... yep, cows. In previous times, cows were shoved off barges from the mainland to swim to the then farm on the shore.




(I didn't know cows could swim... actually I'm still not convinced. Does anyone know?)



That's Koma Kulshan (aka Mount Baker)... gorgeous eh? Although I'm in Canada, Mount Baker is in the US state of Washington and like many mountains in the area, it's an active volcano. It's the most active volcano in the Cascade Mountain Range after Mount St Helens - remember her?

Koma Kulshan is to the east of Cattle Point. Here's a view to the south.



The Olympic Mountains, also in Washington State. The bit of land with the buildings on it is still Victoria (Oak Bay), Vancouver Island, Canada and then the mountains behind are in the US across the Juan de Fuca Straight.

From Cattle Point, I walked down to Willows Beach... driftwood fun, dog walking and people chillin'. Nice.





Anyways... (Hi Neil), to conclude, it was a beautiful day. Warm sun, crisp fresh air and signs of spring everywhere:

Scenic Sunday... sammich anyone?

This is the view from the summit of the Malahat... a section of the TransCanada Highway that winds northwards up the Island from Victoria (BC, Canada).

Nice place for a sammich, eh? What will you have? What's your favourite sammich?



Enjoy your sammich and please don't litter...

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Scenery to die for.

These photos were taken last year at about this time in the Elmwood Cemetery in the town of Perth, Ontario where I lived for about a month. Where I live now, Vancouver Island BC, with its rain forest mix of evergreen trees, simply can not match the unique gorgeousness of these fall colours:

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Scenic Sunday... living on the water.

The other day I spent a few hours at 'Fisherman's Wharf' in Victoria, BC. It use to be a place where you saw salty dogs, working fishing vessels and fish being sold straight off the boats and you ate fish 'n chips at Barb's Place.




Fisherman's Wharf has changed over the years. There are still fishing boats but now about half the wharf is a small community of houseboats or floathomes (not sure which is the more accurate wording). Also, joining Barb's Place are several more floating businesses; a kayak rental place, a tourist shop and more food venders.




I think they've done an alright job at changing the use of the wharf without erasing its charm. Not something I would say about a few of the other wharfs in Victoria that are now inaccessible docks for snots and their yachts.

Anyways ( hi Neil ;-) ), here are some pics. They aren't the greatest pics as you can only stand back so far on a narrow dock! I will have to go back with a different camera or lens.

One of the 'streets':




Various homes:














Scuba diving finds and old gear put to an interesting use:




Love it!




Great vibe about the place!




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I only count the sunny hours...

This one's for Neil.





A sundial and, as you would expect, it sits atop of an orca carving like a sort of pork pie hat.







This was created by Coast Salish (local indigenous peeps) carver Aubrey La Fortune and it sits in the middle of an herb garden, one of the many gardens at Government House. In the summer it smells positively gorgeous with the heat from the sun stirring up all the herby scents.

After taking those photos, I meandered through the neighbourhood and saw this front garden completely in bloom. Click to enlarge the second pic and look at the cut out shape of the wooden bits (can't think of the word!) on the front porch...






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Scenic Sunday

I'm being lazy today and hibernating but this was taken a couple of Sundays ago. It's Koma Kulshan, aka Mt Baker, in Washington State from Victoria, BC.



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