Travelling in winter

( blogger light box sometimes doesn't work when clicking on photos so you must go back after click)

winter crossing though the gulf island in the strait of Georgia from Victoria to Vancouver on the mainland

Next to Vancouver Island my next favourite place just happens to be where my brother lives in the beautiful Okanagan Valley, between the two lakes, embraced by the mountains and the meeting place of the winds.
They actually enjoy winter there and it was lovely to get away from the damp fog of the west coast with it's rainy storms and head into the interior of BC where they have fog too in winter (because of the lakes) but it is a frosty fog!!

morning fog lamp

and so we headed off on a misty morning to the mountains close by, passing fields and sleeping orchards, cows and horses grazing as the sun shone through the fog illuminating the landscape,  and onward, down graceful roads until

we come to The red bridge
and finally we see snow!!!

Kato's spirit runs free here through the trees
and along the creek

Apex Mountain!!!
but  no fresh snowfall as it has been warm this winter.  The lodge is a great place to have lunch and a pint. As you watch the skiers and snowboarders in graceful glide down the course it has a zen feeling of peace through motion.

The beautiful ice skating path

I post processed this photo to look like an illustration from a fairy tale but it looked like that anyway!!

An afternoon at Fort Rodd Hill

which way to the Java Sea?

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  Oh very young by Cat Stevens (Jusuf Islam)

This is a beautiful song by Cat Stevens and as I watched the girls explore every nook and cranny, the tunnels and the hills with such enthusiasm I remembered what it was like when everything was an adventure.  Then we become older and bogged down with the mundane, the cares of struggling to keep an identity in a technological age and in the burdens of our own self importance, forgetting who we once were - pure beings dancing through the music of our encounters..  I may not  be able to run up the hill with quite as much wild abandon but I pray I haven't been so tamed that my mind has not lost the wonder of reaching the summit in triumphant wave of the deed to those below..

So "very young" thank you for letting us dance awhile with you through this historic landmark of Fort Rodd!!

Fort Rodd was established in 1896 as part of the Esquimalt Naval Base located at the mouth of Esquimalt harbour.  The Fisgard Lighthouse had been already standing since 1860 and it became the beacon for the Royal Navy as well as many a sailing ship in it's day.
The west coast of Vancouver Island had treacherous rocks and tides and many ships went down in what was known to sailors of the day  as "the graveyard of the Pacific."  A book was written about it by local author and former cable station operator,  the late R.B. Scott called "Breakers Ahead."
In World War II it was active as one of the armed look out stations (also at Macaulay Point) in case of a Japanese attack. 

Gateway to the grounds

The grounds are beautiful with the Olympic mountains across the strait and lots of wildlife in the surrounding woodlands and lagoons

                                                                                  dancing at the lagoon

is it loaded?

Life in the old fort
activated recordings tell us the stories of those who lived here

Infinity lies beyond but how to get there!!?
Old tunnels and magazines with rows of disarmed artillery shells lie under the hill
and wonderful hide and seek

The lighthouse inside is cosy with lots of charts lying around and a tea kettle on the old wood stove as though the lighthouse keeper just stepped out to check the wind vane. Here I got an interesting effect through the window with a ghostly reflection of the opposite coastline.

ghosties and ghouliesand those who find entering and exiting by windows infinitely more interesting than by ordinary doors

It is said that the Lighthouse and grounds are haunted and paranormal investigations are carried out here by local ghost hunters.


who goes at the darkened window!!?

Esquimalt Lagoon Beach next to Fort Rodd 

Happy New Year from the Butchart Gardens!!   Victoria BC

One of the most beautiful gardens in the world and an absolute delight at Christmas, ablaze with lights and full of fanciful magic.  (12 Days of Christmas).


For more of the light fantastic click on link or the photo

http://dreamshadowexcursions.blogspot.ca/2013/12/happy-new-year.html

The Okanagan Valley, BC June 2013

Our trip to my brother's place in Penticton in the Interior of British Columbia.  ( click on photos for full image slide show)

Well known as wine and orchard country, and much drier than the rainforests of the coast, the region is resplendent with lakes, hills, valleys and mountains that are dotted with prickly pear cactus, silver and purple sage bush and wild flowers. Pine and Spruce trees cover some hills while golden brown antelope grass covers the drier areas. The main lakes are Okanagan( meaning Big Head) and Skaha ( meaning either dog or horse depending on dialect perhaps).  The area is rich in the smokey fires of legends and myth and steeped in the spirituality of earth sacredness.  "Ogopogo" or Naitaka (lake demon)  swims the waters of the Okanagan and a few have seen him. I think he is related to the one in Loch Ness so perhaps "caverns measureless to man" and a "sunless sea" join the two lakes through the center of the earth.
Many ranches and little farms dot the sweeping landscape with a few small towns tucked away between shadow and light.  The weather and landscapes are dramatic and changeable with hot summers and cold winters.  There is good skiing at Apex mountain and local astronomers gather on Mount Kobo every year to stargaze.  The impressive Radio Observatory is near White Lake and sweeps the cosmos for extraterrestrial song and the hum of creation.  There is also a good fossil area in the White Lake Formation region for early Cenozoic vegetation. I found several large rocks with natures' graceful brushwork of carbonized ferns in the shale from 50 million years ago.  They are now sitting in my living room and on my deck garden!



Hills and Valleys, light and shadow

windswept sky

Sudden storms and illuminated landscapes
as seen from my brother's house

 House on the bluff

Lake Skaha at sunset

a rapt audience   "E.T we hear you!"

Vineyards and Orchards in fullness

"Joy to the world, all the boys and girls, ... BC has a mighty fine wine"

This prayer is part of a nine-day Navajo ritual called the Night Chant.

In beauty may I walk.
All day long may I walk.
Through the returning seasons may I walk.
Beautifully will I possess again.
Beautifully birds . . .
Beautifully joyful birds
On the trail marked with pollen may I walk.
With grasshoppers about my feet may I walk.
With dew about my feet may I walk.


A night in the forest

With beauty may I walk.
With beauty before me, may I walk.
With beauty behind me, may I walk.
With beauty above me, may I walk.
With beauty below me, may I walk.
With beauty all around me, may I walk.
In old age wandering on a trail of beauty, lively, may I walk.
In old age wandering on a trail of beauty, living again, may I walk.
It is finished in beauty.
It is finished in beauty.


A Navajo Indian Prayer of the Second Day of the Night Chant (anonymous) 
dedicated to my nephew, David who graduated this June in keremeos and in honour of his own connection to the first nations.

These singers from the Similkameen Valley blessed the graduates.