Waking up this morning overlooking the marina I couldn’t wait to get up at golden hour and take some photos. Being a Pisces I’m naturally drawn to all things water! I quickly dressed, grabbed my camera and was out the door to see what I could shoot!
I walked down past the very large Pedder Bay Marina to take this photo of Pedder Bay as the sun was rising. Just a gorgeous piece of B.C. real estate!
Walking back through the marina I saw some fishing boats and pleasure boats. I liked the saying on this one boat which was called “THE OTHER OFFICE”...the guy had 3 - 350 outboard motors on his boat! I also found a boat for a friend of mine from Georgetown Golf Club!
Just to give you some perspective on our site, I took some pictures from the marina looking back up at Newman & Jerry.
Our bedroom window at the back of Newman overlooks the water. What a stunning view and we are also very happy to have a deck! We will have to get our big chairs out of Newman’s basement and sit still for a minute to enjoy the view!
When we arrived last evening we were tired and we made the rookie mistake of not checking where the hookups for the RV were. We drove in nose first and then realized the hookups were for a “backed in” RV. Richard had to drive around the wrong way on the road in the RV park and back into our site. The problem we discovered after he backed in, was we were still not close enough to to the sewage hook up! So this morning we had to bring all the slides in, and I had to be the spotter so Richard wouldn’t back up too far and go crashing into the deck. Richard had to get Newman close enough to the cedar hedge to be able to hook up, while still being able to open our slides! It didn’t take too long to manoeuvre the rig and now we have full hookups. The perfect thing to do before we went out for the day now that we were all hooked up,.......more laundry!
I rushed Richard through his morning coffee so we could get out early to do some hiking. There is about 30 minutes less minutes of daylight here in Vancouver Istand as we are more North than Fort Erie, Ontario...so ”pitter patter....let’s get at ’er”!
Before coming to the Island I had done quite a bit of research on what guide books we should purchase to be able to go hiking and sightseeing on the island. I found an amazing book called Backroad Mapbooks for Vancouver Island, Victoria and the Gulf Islands. Everything you wanted to do including fishing, hunting, paddling, parks, recsites, trails and more. After studying the guide book last evening I decided we would head to Becher Bay to try out the “Coast Trail” at East Sooke Regional Park. The park is accessed via a very windy and hilly road 5.5km away from Pedder Bay.
The guide book says the Coast Trail is a “challenging but exhilarating 10km hike along some surprisingly remote bits of coastline with spectacular views of the Olympic Mountains and the Juan De Fuca Strait....expect an elevation gain of 1,710 feet.” I’m always up for a challenge and why not give the new and improved femur a go! Little did I know what we were getting ourselves into!!
Our first sighting of the beautiful, majestic Olympic Mountains in Washington State.
An easy fairly flat and level section of the Coast trail
A not so easy hilly, rocky and slippery section of the Coast trail!
We were hiking the trail and after a particularly tricky down hill, over tree roots sections of the trail we stumbled onto a couple of locals who were nearly finished their hike. I mentioned that I was trying out my new and improved leg and the guy said to me “here, have my walking stick. You really need 3 points of contact on the trail!” The walking stick really did help for leverage, and so did Richard’s back and hands as we went up and down the very tricky trail. And I have kept the walking stick for future hikes!
The Coast Trail is known for being the site of a Petroglyph at Aldridge Point which I was very interested in seeing. A Petroglyph is “Petros” - stone and “Glyphs - I carve.
The seal petroglyph which is protected by the Historical Sites Act in B.C.
If you look very closely, you can see the petroglyph right at the end of my camera.
I enjoyed sitting on a rock resting before we attacked the trail for our return journey to the car. I was trying to capture the surf coming into this little bay. The sun was trying so hard to come out and the temperature was a balmy +8C with no wind. By the time we hiked the hour back to Jerry, we were ready to take off our jackets. A lovely way to start the day getting lots of fresh air and enjoying new scenery!
After our hike, we took a quick drive up to Sooke to see if we could find somewhere to have lunch. My son (who lives on the island) had suggested a spot called “Shirley Delicious Cafe”, but they were not open until Saturday, Instead, we stumbled on a wonderful little cafe/bakery and enjoyed our lunch safely in Jerry.
The lemon curd shortbread tart which we split was to die for!
A wonderful first day on the island exploring...with months and months of adventures to come!