Janet Brien's photos with the keyword: ferry

(+4 insets!) (Please view large for more details!) Vancouver Island's bustling city of Nanaimo is perfectly located between the rugged, sparsely populated northern town of Port Hardy and the metropolitan city of Victoria in the south. I mentioned in my last report how unfortunate it was that we weren't able to book a 5-day stay at our campground. We had to make due with three days and because we wanted to be in the area for a total of at least five days, we found another campsite just a bit north which we booked for four days. However, as I've mentioned on other posts, any "travel" day, no matter how short, is a complete disruption and we hate it. Usually we cannot do anything at all on those days other than get from Point A to Point B, set up, eat dinner, and then wind down before bed. In this case, we had exactly ONE full day to be in this area and throwing out all the other excursions around, we decided to go to Newcastle Island for the day. Located just off the coast of Nanaimo, it's just a short 10-minute ferry ride over to this sizable and culturally significant island. Owned and managed by the Snuneymuxw First Nation people, the proper name for Newcastle Island is Saysutshun, which means ' training for running.' This island has always been hugely important to the Snuneymuxw as a place of physical and spiritual healing and to prepare mentally for races or battles. There are no cars or motor vehicles allowed (except for First People's maintenance-related) and there is something really wonderful about being required to walk or ride a bike to get anywhere. This being said, we decided to take our bikes with us on our adventure, as it is a fantastic way to see the island and travel on its 22 km of well-maintained trails. Saysutshun's little ferry runs to and fro every 30 minutes with a modest fee of $9 for a roundtrip ticket which includes a bike and we were so excited as we parked and made our way over to the pier. Today's Pictures My main picture today also works for Happy Fence Friday! It shows the walkway down to the docking area for the ferry and temporary docking. Our ferry, the Grey Selkie , is docked in place on the left side with another boat docked on the right. This picture was taken after we returned from Saysutshun but I wanted to use it so you could see the ferry. I was so excited when it arrived that I totally forgot to take one! :D We only waited for about five minutes before the boat pulled up and while we waited I got a picture of the cute little blue boat docked there. We initially thought it was the ferry but realized that it probably wasn't, especially when the actual one pulled up! Once it was tied to the pier, Steve helped the captain and assistant to lift our bikes up to the cargo area on top of the boat. After we were seated I took a picture of the inside which I thought was really interesting. I'd never been in such a small ferry before and was overwhelmed by the "cute" factor of this little work boat! I have also included a panorama that I took as we motored from Nanaimo to Saysutshun. You can see just how close the island is to the mainland on the left side of the picture. You can see the Nanaimo harbor and also, near the right side of the panorama, Saysutshun's harbor! Pretty cool! :) (The land mass on the right side is Protection Island, a First People's private land, not normally visited by non-indigenous people and a home to many of these folk.) Pam, I hope that you are comfortable and resting a lot. You've been in my thoughts so often and I am very relieved that all went well. This hurdle out of the way, now you can focus on being as well as possible. I hope that you get a little better quality of life with this stress out of the way. Maybe there is a possibility that your Left Side Neglect will fade some as time passes from your procedure. You mentioned that what's done is done but I can't help hoping for some improvements for you. *BIG HUGS* from southern Oregon. Explored on 1/24/20; highest placement #4.

(+ 9 insets) Trip Talk: No candid people photography this trip! We chose to just enjoy wandering around... When I thought about visiting Victoria, I hoped to work on my skills of candid people pictures. However, I have to be in the right mood for this sort of sneaky photography and as it turned out, I just didn't feel like it. Any time a camera is aimed in the direction of a person (even if the camera is down low and obscured), there's potential to be glared at or even aggressively approached. Steve and I just wanted to walk around without thinking about anything but enjoying the sights. It would turn out that during the entire trip, I never did feel like working on people-oriented street photography. Funny how it works out like that sometimes. A shame because I really do enjoy how these turn out but I'll have plenty of opportunities in the future. We love the modern, clean streets of Victoria and we also appreciated that most of the city's "must-see" destinations are all within a reasonable walking distance—it worked out to be about 5-7 miles to get from downtown to the harbor and then to the far side and back again. You also couldn't have asked for better weather. It was a lovely, sunny and warm day with the perfect breeze. Steve and I were so happy! Today's Pictures My main picture today celebrates Happy Fence Friday! This substantial metal post and rusty chain are doing their job to hold back the throngs of visitors to Victoria's beautiful harbor district. The boat you see is the MS Coho , an enormous passenger and vehicle-carrying ferry which travels back and forth between Victoria and Port Angeles, Washington (the boat we took from Anacortes to Sidney, north Victoria was the 1981 MS Chelan .) Steve and I were surprised to see that when this ferry left dock, it backed up a very long way so that it could tuck its back end into another wide channel and then turn around. We were both totally fascinated at the speed it went backwards and also how quickly it was able to turn around and head out. The rest of my second Victoria presentation includes more harbor images and some of the fun things I saw as we enjoyed this lovely day! Inset 1: The MS Coho, built and put into service in 1959, is shown here backing up in preparation to turn around and head back to Port Angeles, Washington. This ship typically makes the two-hour trip twice each way every day! Inset 2: As Steve and headed out to the water's edge at the Victoria harbor, I found this wonderful mural that shows a very similar scene to my main image the other day! Inset 3: I saw this mural on the side of a building near the harbor and did my best to get a good picture. I only noticed later that Robert Wyland himself had painted it in 1987, one of dozens of his "Whaling Walls" found around the world. (You can see Wyland's signature on the lower left of the mural) Inset 4: I just loved the awesome design of this artistic, creative bench! Inset 5: At one point we walked through a park where we found a shady bench to have a seat (not the one shown in Inset 5!). There we looked out on the bay and saw this pretty view. Inset 6: Seated at the park bench, we saw a group of Canada Geese floating through colorful reflections on the water. Inset 7: We also saw this huge orange tour boat, complete with tourists adorned in matching life jackets! Inset 8: On our walk we visited Victoria's wharf and I couldn't help taking a picture of the wonderful sign that welcomed everyone passing by. Inset 9: This gentleman was very busy selling his day's catch of crabs. We were surprised at the fair price (going rate: $25 per crab)--we figured they'd be offered at a ripoff for tourists. Pam, have you ever been on a big ferry like the one here? I am in total awe of these monster ships and it was just incredible to have our truck and RV on one, with so much room for dozens of other vehicles. Another thing that's fascinating is that even underway, there is very little motion detectable. Of course this would change if there was a storm but for the most part you hardly knew the boat was moving along at quite a fast clip! Well, I hope you are having a good day...my thoughts are with you! *BIG HUGS* from southern Oregon...oh, and I apologize for not including a note to you in my last post! I was in such a hurry to get the presentation together that it slipped my mind! UGH! :P Explored on 9/21/19; highest placement #8.