What a crazy day we had today. I woke up with a sore head from my the back of my neck up and the weather was not co-operating either, as I was also having a barometric headache. I think playing 36 holes of golf in cool weather the past two days didn’t help my body, which is not used to that much golf! Finally I asked Richard if he could give my neck a very gentle massage to relieve the neck strain I was having that was causing the headache.
In the meantime we had driving rain, high winds and there were forecasts that we would also have hail! What a crazy weather day!
Finally after not being able to get rid of my head and neck ache, I took 2 Excedrin and went back to bed for a nap. I NEVER NAP! So today was particularly weird for me to have to chill out and relax instead of being GO GO GO!!!!
Richard in the meantime was busy washing our sheets and my fluffy blanket at the RV Park laundromat. It’s easier to wash large loads at our laundromat, than to try and wash them in Newman.
Finally after a neck massage, a nap and a hot shower, I felt well enough to go out Just as we were about to head out though, a really heavy down pour of rain started. Richard came walking into Newman with the sheets and blanket shoved down his coat to try and keep everything dry. We waited out the storm a bit before we went to Jerry and just then, the rain stopped.
I had read on Facebook that there were orca sitings yesterday in Deep Bay near Chrome Island and Denman Island, so I wanted to go over to Deep Bay to see if we could see any whales today.
We got over to Deep Bay which is only 7 minutes from our RV park, and then the hail started! What a weird weather day!
Chrome Island from Deep Bay. The weather was very stormy, and the sky was very overcast.
We didn’t see any orca whales in Deep Bay. I think the whales are hiding from us on this trip to Vancouver Island! There were quite a few cars driving down the one ocean side residential street in Deep Bay, which is unusual, since it is such a small strip of land. I think other people may have also seen the post on Facebook about the orca sighting yesterday. That will be our last time we visit Deep Bay on this trip. It’s sad when its the ‘last’ time for something that we’ve taken for granted that we would do again in the near future. It is such an easy drive to Deep Bay, so we’ve been there quite a bit during our time here on the Island.
We needed to get some groceries today as we were running low on fresh produce and fruits, since we’ve been busy golfing, instead of shopping, the past few days. We decided to head down the Coastal Hwy for one last trip to Qualicum Beach today to our local Quality Foods for groceries. I wanted to make chicken quesadillas for dinner so I thought we could get a fresh cooked chicken at Quality Foods, in Q. Beach.
We saw the neatest thing ever when we entered the grocery store today.
A self cleaning grocery cart machine! Very cool! Sanitize hands. Insert cart. Push button. Wait for the light to turn green. Remove cart. Voila! Sanitized cart. Maybe they have these other places, but this is the first self cart sanitization station we have seen.
Since we have been on the Island and shopping at Quality Foods in either Courtenay or Qualicum Beach we’ve been using our ‘Q Card’ loyalty card. Today when we got to the checkout in Qualicum Beach at Quality Foods the cashier asked us if we wanted to redeem 99,000 points to get our cooked chicken for free today! What a deal! A $9,99 free chicken for dinner! It sure pays to sign up for the grocery store loyalty cards as it didn’t take us very long to start getting free stuff!
After grocery shopping we decided to stop at the B.C. Liquor store in Qualicum Beach to stock up on some B.C. wines.
We love the Gray Monk Pinot Gris so much that we bought 4 bottles of it! The Osoyoos Larose was the wine that was recommended by a friend from Ontario yesterday on our Zoom call, so we picked up 2 bottles of this very special wine too! Under our dining room table in Newman we have quite a nice selection of B.C. wines now! We can’t wait to share them with some friends back home once we are allowed to gather!
We decided to check out a new part of Qualicum Beach we hadn’t been in our travels and we found a very neat little spot for kids.
A little village for children built by the Qualicum Beach Sunrise Rotary,
Each of the buildings in Storybook Village represents a building that would normally be in the town such as: The Library, The Fire Hall, The Hospital, The Community Centre, etc. etc.
Storybook Village encourages play so that children develop fine and gross motor skills, language, socialization, personal awareness, emotional wellbeing, creativity, problem solving and learning. The Storybook Village was built for the kids by the community. Storybook village is an imaginative language, early learning outdoor play environment.
After visiting Storybook Village we headed down to Eaglecrest Golf Club in Qualicum Beach. We had heard that this 18 hole golf course was being reduced to 9 holes now as a result of a dispute with the Town of Qualicum Beach. The golf course leases the land for the 17th hole and the 18th tee deck from the Town and the club owners were apparently upset that the new lease for this land was going to cost the course more money. We spoke to the head pro at Pheasant Glen about the dispute and he said that the increased cost of leasing the land was not the issue, rather that the owner of the golf course didn’t want to put more money into upgrading the irrigation system, so effective immediately the course would be 9 holes only. I’m sure there are some pretty angry homeowners living on that golf course as well as some angry members who joined because the course was 18 holes!
I think with the cold +2C weather we had today and rain, there must have been snow falling in the mountains today! This little spot that we stopped at the bottom of Eaglecrest subdivision had some nice ‘walk on’ waterfront homes and beautiful views over to Denman and Hornby Island across the Salish Sea/Strait of Georgia.
More stunning views from the Eaglecrest beach area. The street we were on was called ‘Butterball Drive!’
We drove home feeling a bit strange knowing that today was the last time we would drive up and down the Coastal Hwy to visit Qualicum Beach. We really came to love this little town and spent so much time golfing Qualicum Beach Memorial Golf Club with our new friends Ken & Curtis, that the Qualicum Beach area really started to feel like ‘home’ for us. Like Richard said when we were driving back to Fanny Bay this afternoon “you know you feel good about an area when you know where you can go to get something. because you know where the grocery store is, the liquor store (important of course!) is and where to go for the best pedicures.” As we drove by the Qualicum Beach Memorial golf course, despite the weather only improving to a balmy +4C, we still saw die hearts out there walking the golf course and getting their round in at 4:20pm in the afternoon! It’s amazing how many people will golf in not ideal conditions, so they are getting their exercise. The same was to be said on the boardwalk in Q. Beach, driving home. Once the rain had stopped, the local people of Q. Beach were out beach and boardwalk walking. That is the last time we will see this beautiful town for awhile.
When we got home I started reading the BC Liquor store magazine. Much like the ‘Food & Drink’ magazine in Ontario, the B.C. Liquor store has their own publication featuring a lot of great B.C. wines, as well as food and drink recipes. I will bring it home in case anyone is interested in looking at it.
Chilling on the couch....
What a great publication!
This recipe for Miso Halibut with Sake Butter Sauce looked amazing!
I’m posting the recipe just in case anyone back home can find fresh halibut!
As I was reading the Taste magazine and relaxing I decided to look at my ‘Whoop strap’ data on my iPhone. I noticed watching the WGC Matchplay this morning that Whoop has now started advertising on the Golf Channel. I know Justin Thomas and. Rory McIlroy both wear Whoop straps because they often post data from their Whoop strap on Instagram. I believe I blogged about Whoop earlier, but for those of you who missed it, the Whoop strap measures Sleep, Strain and Recovery. I wondered why I was feeling so tired today and then I started checking my Whoop strap data history, and my day’s strain for each of the days in the past 2 weeks has been fairly high for me. The max strain is 21.0 and I’ve been averaging between 5-9 strain. Finally today my strain was only 1.9, so I’m giving my body a chance to relax and recover after a pretty busy two weeks of strain.
And yes Whoop measures naps too! I don’t do anything except wear the strap and my Whoop automatically measures everything else from sleep to strain. It was developed at Harvard University and I’m a huge fan of Whoop and the data it gives me from wearing it.
Tonight we were making Chicken Quesadillas for dinner. I think quesadillas are a fun, easy meal and along with the quesadillas we were having a homemade Caesar salad and adding some of the preserved lemons that I made a few months ago, that have turned out beautifully in the mason jar with salt in the fridge in Newman.
It smells so good in Newman cooking the onions and peppers on the stove in the Le Cruset cast iron skillet.
Yum! Grilled on our Lodge cast iron grill pan on the gas stove in Newman.
While we were having dinner I had to run outside to take photos during blue hour. The sunset was amazing tonight over Fanny Bay.
The colours were stunning tonight at sunset in Fanny Bay. We hope this is not the last beautiful sunset before we leave on Thursday.
Sunset over Fanny Bay. I love the reflection of the clouds in the water over the oyster rafts.
Richard had a quick call with St. Stephen and Karen to find out where they had gotten to today on their drive back to Nova Scotia. It turns out they had a great day of driving and drove all the way from Brandon, Manitoba to Thunder Bay, Ontario! That’s a lot of driving in one day! Wow! 925 km in one day of driving...that’s intense! As Richard was speaking with St. Stephen I had to pop outside again to capture a photo of the full moon which had just risen over Fanny Bay.
Full moon over Fanny Bay tonight. This full moon is called ‘The Worm Moon’ as this is the month of spring when the earthworms come out of the ground. The Worm Moon is the fourth closest full moon of the year and it the fourth brightest and biggest full moon.
It didn’t feel like we did too much today, but now that I’m feeling better, it feels like we did just enough today. These last few days on the Island are going to be busy so while we are feeling a little sad not to be able to visit our favourite places anymore, we know we can always come back and we will feel like locals once we do!
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