Woke up, stuck my head out the curtains of the balcony and noticed that if there had been a forest out the back as we had suspected last night, someone had come during the night and cut it all down. Because apart from one or two trunks, we had a marvellous view of the beach and further out, the Straits of Georgia and the Canadian coast.

We took a short drive down the road into Parksville proper and bought some provisions – and batteries for the camera – at a supermarket, came back to the cabin and had breakfast. As you can tell from the photos of the cabin, the new batteries did the trick and the camera started working again.

We decided that after breakfast, a long walk along the beach was in order. The weather was kind of bleak, and the air brisk, but the straits were calm and the horizon very interesting.

There was a patch of sand where people had piled rocks in little cairns. Considering that perhaps this was a local custom for visitors, we added our own to the group, and walked on.

Eventually we came to a point where it was kind of obvious that we should either retrace our steps or keep going and hope that it turned into a loop. There wasn’t much chance of the loop scenario, so we turned back and walked with the sea to our left for a change.

Back at the cabin, we ate lunch and read and napped for bit, while deciding what our next move would be. A place called “Little Qualicum Falls” sounded picturesque, and close enough to drive there, look around, and drive back before it got dark. There was also a place further inland called “Cathedral Grove” that sounded worth a visit also.

On the way there, we noticed a lot of arts and crafts places and figured on stopping on the way back to look around.

Little Qualicum Falls turned out to be a bunch of walking tracks, weaving their way in and around a river surrounding by fairly dense rainforest. We parked the car and started walking, dodging the occasional drops of water making their way through the canopy.

We walked all the way around the two bridges over the river, taking a number of photos. Despite the fact that there were several cars parked when we arrived, we only saw one couple walking at one point on the track across the river. There were two waterfalls, a “lower” and an “upper” one. I’m sure there are many waterfalls in the world that surpass these on a scale of spectacallity, but there was something about the tranquility and mistiness of the place that was very seductive. I liked it.

We walked back to the car and only got lost once. With our woolly hats it was like our own little Blair Witch project. When we got back to the car, we were the only ones parked there. Everyone else had left. We decided not to drive on to Cathedral Grove but to turn back towards the coast and check out one of the craft places. It was looking like it might get dark at any moment.

We navigated our way back to our cabin in the dark, rested for a bit, then walked down to the restaurant again for a “light” dinner. This plan didn’t really work – we had dinner, but it just wasn’t “light”. I don’t think they know how to do “light”. The appetizers were pretty good, and I limited myself to a bowl of seafood chowder for my main.

We got up, packed our bags, checked out, and left our bags with the hotel porter downstairs while we wandered around the streets of Victoria shopping and looking for breakfast, and seeing what else there was to see.

We had seen Munro’s Bookshop the previous evening, so we stopped in. According to the “Victoria Visitor’s Guide” brochure we had, “your visit to Victoria is not complete without taking some time to browse Munro’s Books. Located in an outstanding neo-classical heritage building…”. The wall hangings and stained glass windows were pretty. The books were good too. We spent quite a bit of time there, browsing through books.

We found our breakfast in a Dutch Pancake restaurant. Other notable stops: I found some volumes of collected issues of Cerebus in a comics store; Lisa found liquorice in a British Candy Shoppe; and  Mitchell found speakers in an audio store. After following Mitchell into the audio store, I wandered around, went outside, and finally met up with Lisa and Mitchell in a Glass craft gallery. They had glass furnaces inside the gallery, and lots of beautiful pieces of work arranged for display around the balcony overlooking the work area. We saw one guy getting lessons on how to make a stemmed goblet.

Regretfully, it soon became time to collect our bags from the porter at the Empress Hotel, and go and pick up our rental car from Avis, which was thankfully located only a couple of blocks away. The car turned out to be – once again – a dreaded red Pontiac Grand Am. I guess it is Avis’ standard midsize vehicle! This one had BC license plates rather than Arkansas ones.

We followed Vicky’s instructions reasonably closely and navigated our way to Oak bay, and spent some time with Muriel, Vicky, and Robert and Marita. At this point, the camera decided to stop working, or I would have had some photos of this event. It was a bit of a worry, because we were about to drive straight into serious scenery and were intending to use the camera quite a bit! I had just put what I thought were new batteries in it, and although we were traveling with some rechargeables, we had packed the recharger in the other bag! We were sure that we wouldn’t need it until we returned to Seattle. Nothing to be done – we’d have to try fresh batteries as soon as we could. We had a great time talking, drinking coffee, and eating oat biscuits with Muriel and her daughter Vicky, and her children Robert and Marita were companionable and lots of fun also.

Before it got dark, we took our leave of Vicky and Muriel and, again following their instructions, drove around the bay and back towards Trans-Canada Highway 1, whereupon we continued up Vancouver Island looking for a place called Parksville.

It got dark pretty quickly, sooner than we thought (well, we were quite a bit further North than San Francisco). We didn’t see much except for early in the journey, and that was mostly trees and cliffs and lakes, and I didn’t see much of that because I insisted on driving.

We covered the 175km to Parksville in about 2 hours, and without incidents arrived at the Tigh Na Mara Resort Hotel. This turns out to be a forest dotted with log cabin buildings, very secluded and at this time of year, almost deserted. We had no idea what kind of view the balcony had, it was pitch dark. We could see the trunks of some trees, could have been a dense forest for all we knew.

The cabin itself is very cozy, with a bathroom, bedroom, and a large combined kitchen/dining/lounge with a balcony – we were on the top floor of the block.

Apparently the seafood restaurant at the resort is very reputable, and that’s where we had dinner. It was a very good one, and we staggered back to our cabin considerably heavier. What were we going to do about our weight gain? It wasn’t nearly Thanksgiving yet.

We got up nice and early because our flight to Seattle leaves at 9:00am, and we have to get down through San Francisco to the airport, and park our car in long-term parking. This time we tried a different parking company than usual, because we’ve had the coupons for ages and we had a little extra time in hand to compensate for getting lost, should it happen. It didn’t, but the car park was almost full already, and Thanksgiving wasn’t until Thursday! It pays to be early.

Walt K. met us at the airport, and – unexpected bonus – it turns out that he wasn’t busy and could hang with us in Seattle for a few hours. This was great. We found a car park near the Pikes Place market area and wandered around looking at things.

We found some Maple honey that looked rather good, and lots of arts and crafts and produce and stuff. Around lunchtime we decided to wait until a table was free at a place called “The Cafe at La Campagne” and it was absolutely worth it. Spectacular French country cooking. I chose an oven-baked leg of preserved duck which was fantastique. Best lunch ever.

After lunch we staggered out of the cafe and wobbled back to the car park. On the way to find the HeliJet terminal, we decided to kill another hour or so at the Flight Museum at Boeing Field. Another unexpected bonus. There were lots of cool things to see there – the Gossamer Albatross, half of a 737, a fearsome looking Blackbird, and tons of cockpits and displays. There was a section covering space stuff, including shuttles and Apollo, and one of the moon buggies.

The museum is located on the original site of the first Boeing Aircraft factory – a big red barn, which has been restored and forms part of the museum structure. It has some of the original woodworking machinery and other displays.

Outside in front of the museum there was a retired “Air Force One”, dating from the Nixon and Kennedy administrations, one of the last ones before they switched to using a 747. You could walk through the entire length of the jet and see where the press sat, the communication post, the galley, etc. It all looked very comfortable and important. We had hoped to see Mt Rainier but it was being reticent. While I was on Air Force One I did manage to see it out one of the windows, and I took a picture.

As it was beginning to get dark, we drove around the perimeter of Boeing Field and eventually came across the HeliJet terminal. Because they fly across the border to Vancouver and Victoria in Canada, they are an “International Airport” complete with a tiny customs office.

We arranged our baggage so that Walt took half with him for later, leaving us with a bag each for the helijet.

It was completely dark by the time the HeliJet was ready to take off, and it turned out that we were the only passengers on the flight. The actual takeoff was kind of strange: The main rotor has to get up to speed, going through all sorts of resonant frequencies as it does so. At one point the cabin was rocking from side to side almost as though a rugby team were providing the power via pedals. That’s really the best description of the feeling. Ornithopter-esque. Pretty soon, though, the rotor was up to speed and the cabin was vibrating but not swaying. Then we taxied forward until we were in the middle of a circle painted on the tarmac, at which point we gently wafted into the sky, continuing to move forward but getting higher and higher, until the nose dropped slightly and we started flying through the night.

It was rather like being in a large SUV, only with three rows of bench seats behind the drivers. More dials and control panels too. The Sikorsky had room for two pilots and twelve passengers, so it felt quite odd for the three of us to be chauffeured across the water by these two pilots.

The 30 minute journey took place in almost complete darkness – I was looking out the window and I could see the lights of car and buildings, until we were over water and all I could see was the reflection of Jupiter and Saturn over the water. Despite the noise it was very romantic, and Lisa and I held hands.

Eventually the lights of Victoria came into view, and as we descended we could see bays and docks and even the dome of some big building outlined in lights.

After we landed, Customs was relatively straight-forward, except that we had three different kinds of passports – US, NZ, and UK – and had spent different amounts of time in the States and two of us were married, but eventually we got it all straightened out and we could go through the door and into the terminal proper. There’s a free shuttle to the Empress Hotel, which is where we were staying for one night, but there was some problem with this – I don’t remember what, exactly – and they gave us a taxi-coupon instead.

On the way to the Empress, we saw what that outlined dome was that we’d seen from the air: there’s this official government building thing that is all outlined in lights.

After we’d checked into our room at the Empress, which was very comfortable, we decided to go out and wander around Victoria. It was only 8:30pm, although it seemed later. We weren’t hungry at all after the fantastic lunch we’d had earlier in the day, but we weren’t sleepy, either.

We bundled ourselves up with many layers and woolly hats and scarves and went outside. It was pretty cold, but the streets were well-lit and there were still a number of people wandering around. We saw a family of raccoons rummaging in a trash can!

We found a market square, with flags and stalls and stuff, that was practically deserted, but lit up all the same. It had a cafe for pets called “Woofers” in it.

Before returning to the Empress and retiring for the night, we grabbed a coffee and desert at an Italian coffee house on Government St.

We had to stick around the house for a business-related phone call (yes, they knew we were on holiday, but I guess some people don’t pay attention…) but before that, Mitchell and I took Karma the Cat to his holiday rest home, Cat’s Cradle. He was due to spend the next week there while the rest of us were off exploring the northern wastes (i.e. British Columbia and Seattle) on our holiday.

Packing for our trip was complicated by the fact that we were going to be taking a helicopter from Seattle across the bay to Victoria, Vancouver Island, BC, and the luggage weight restrictions were such that we had to pack two separate bags – one for the Vancouver leg and then another with clothes and extra things we might need in Seattle upon our return a few days later.

Something else odd happened while we were packing: someone in 12 Carrillo St, San Rafael, rang up and said they had a courier package for me that had been delivered to them by mistake, sent by the ASB Bank, NZ! I was expecting a new credit card from the ASB, because my current one was expiring this month, and they don’t mail new cards internationally. So I decided a couple of weeks ago to take the option of them couriering it. I did expect them to get the address right, however! I drove around the neighbourhood to Carrillo St and picked up the package. Indeed, it was the credit card.

Derek showed up in the afternoon and watched the West Wing episode we’d taped earlier in the week, and I demoed the music studio to Mitchell.

For dinner, we went to our favorite family-style Chinese restaurant, Royal Mandarin. The plan was that Kevin would join us, but as it turned out, he rang and said he’d be catching up with us later on due to work commitments. When we spoke to him, he was still in the South Bay driving up from Santa Clara.

After dinner it was off to the Marin Civic Center Veteran’s Memorial Auditorium for a concert by Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter. They played improvisational jazz duets, about five 20 minute long pieces. I liked some of it, and they are very talented, but it was pretty inaccessible stuff. We had no idea what to expect, we just figured Mitchell would enjoy some live music in that wonderful venue.

Kevin showed up for the last couple of pieces, so that was all right.

After the concert, we retired to the house and drank coffee and Kevin gave us a hilarious recitation of the infamous “Party America” urban legend by the master himself.

Early to bed that evening, because we had a flight to catch the next morning.

After we’d got up and checked email and stuff, we planned our day. First, I took Mitchell out to Macy’s so that he could buy some Levi’s jeans.

When we returned, we decided we would have dinner at Frantoio, and the weather was looked good, so after discussing some options we agreed that a simple picnic would be ideal. We drove off to Trader Joe’s to get supplies, but in the process we saw some rather good looking sushi and changed our plans to allow for lunch at nearby KamiKazi Sushi. We’d been their before once with Derek – is basically next door to Trader Joe’s, so we stopped in there for a light lunch.

About an hour later we staggered out, groaning, wondering how we’d managed to eat so much and hoping we’d still have room for dinner later!

During lunch we had revised our plans and decided to drive up to the Mt Tamalpais lookout, figuring that exploring southern Marin would be a good way to pass the afternoon.

Mitchell and I walked up to the very top where the fire lookout is, and did the usual panoramic vista thing with our cameras. The late autumn light was particularly good, and we got a good view of Mill Valley and the city in the distance. We could even see the top of one of the towers of the Golden Gate Bridge peeking over a hill.

We drove down Mt Tam and took a slightly different route, driving past the entrance to Muir Woods (we would have liked to go in but it was beginning to get dark – we had kind of forgotten how early the sun sets these days!) and eventually made our way back to highway 101, intending to drive around to the lookout on the North side of the Golden Gate Bridge. However, we hit rush hour traffic and when we eventually got to the lookout it was getting dark – and cold. Mitchell and I ran down the path to the lookout and snapped some pictures anyway.

As we returned to the car, we discussed the situation: Frantoio is located nearby, but we were still full from lunch and anyway we were much to early for the reservation we made. The traffic looked bad, and if we did go anywhere we’d have to come back through the traffic, and we were kind of tired. We settled on an alternate plan: We’d check out the audio equipment at the Good Guys store in nearby Corte Madeira, cancel our reservation at Frantoio (another time, Mitchell!) and then drive further North to Borders for book browsing and possibly coffee, and then go to the Broken Drum Grill in San Rafael for dinner. This plan was deemed to be a good one. We only had a few days with Mitchell in San Rafael, and the Broken Drum was definitely one of the places we wanted to take him.

After only about 3 days after Lisa got back from Frankfurt, we start our second official batch of vacation time as our good friend Mitchell arrived from London to spend some time with us here in the States. His plane got in 2 hours late, it was delayed at Heathrow due to loudspeaker failure, I think he said. It was great to see him! We took him directly to Max’s Deli & Restaurant for dinner. Actually, because of his delayed arrival, we were running late, so instead of staying in the South Bay for dinner, we braved the possible remains of rush hour traffic, and I dropped Lisa and Mitchell at our local Max’s and rushed home to drop of his bags off and put a tape in the VCR to record The West Wing.

Mitchell liked being introduced to Max’s Matzo-ball soup, I think. We were all so stuffed, it was all we could do to sit on the couch and watch the freshly-taped episode of The West Wing.