Stormy weather

The recent storm that has troubled parts of the UK has been brought to my attention by the ever helpful BBC website on the InterWebNet. This storm is the second to have been considered powerful enough by the Met Office to have been given a name under their new classification system – though it must be said that compared to ‘Hurricane Joaquin‘ and ‘Typhoon Champi‘ – ‘Storm Barney‘ does sound a little – well – feeble! (My apologies here to any who have suffered damage or inconvenience. I certainly don’t mean to make light of your troubles).

It is marginally by coincidence – this being November on both sides of the Atlantic – that the past few days have also seen the first real storm of the season here on Vancouver Island.

It was only this morning that we could – for the first time in a week and then but briefly – make out Mount Baker through the cloud cover. For the last few days we have been ‘socked in’ – as the parlance has it (according to the Kickass Canada Girl) – and it has both rained heavily and at considerable length and blown half a gale for good measure.

In our little spot on the east side of the peninsula we seem to be quite well protected from the winds but there is still a considerable quantity of detritus on the roads and in our yards (UK: gardens!) from the evergreens. I guess this is just nature’s way of whittling out the dead (not to mention the weak and the feeble) wood before winter really sets in. We also seem to have had a bumper fall of pine needles this year – possibly because the summer was so dry.

The other sign that storm season has arrived manifested on the dot of midday yesterday – when the power went out! One rapidly realises once resident in BC that, in rural areas in particular, virtually all power cables are above ground on poles – and that there are also a lot of very tall conifers around. Add wind to the mix and the outcome is hardly surprising.

The helpful man at BC Hydro told us that the estimated time to fix (“It’s because of the storm” – “No kidding!”) was eight o’ clock in the evening. In the event the power was back by five – but by then we had packed up our lunch makings and scurried over to our good friends’ farm in Saanichton to commit an act of piracy on their kitchen.

We are in the process of having natural gas laid on (they should be doing the install tomorrow) and we are aiming to get a gas log fire for the drawing room and a gas range for the kitchen. We will then at least be able to cook and to keep warm should there be further outages…

…which is – according to the Girl – highly likely.

“Welcome to Victoria” – she muttered wryly!