The Imperceptible Immigrant

Beacon Hill Park

April 18, 2016 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

In my last post I mused upon the notion that Victoria might just be the best possible place in the world to be an expat Brit. At the weekend just passed we enjoyed a delightful dinner engagement with friends who live downtown. The occasion provided (as so often seems to be the case) yet more evidence in support of whichever conjecture happens to be my current fascination.

Earlier posts in this journal attest to my love of springtime… those hazy blue carpets of bluebells… the lush and fragrant azaleas (particular favourites that I would go out of my way to see)… the keening of the peacocks… Peacocks?! Well, yes – for various reasons I associate them with the sort of country estates to which I used to go in search of bluebell woods and azalea glades.

Anyway – before dinner on Saturday we accompanied our friends on a most pleasant stroll through Beacon Hill Park. I took some snaps:

Now – I am very aware that back in the UK it is not yet quite azalea time. Indeed, should you care to follow any of the links above you will find that all of the posts concerned date from various months of May. Yes – here in Victoria spring comes earlier:

And what can this be?

Of course, Victoria has a few things that are more difficult to find back home:

Tags: Fuji x10, Photo, Spring, Victoria

To dwell is to garden

April 4, 2016 in Flotsam and Jetsam, Photos | Permalink

“To dwell is to garden.”

Martin Heidegger

The weather has at last become more clement and it has been possible to get out into the garden and to start doing all that must be done to wake it from its winter slumbers. I am a gardener only in the sense that I have a garden. I do think – however – that it would have made my father happy to see me tending my (half) acre(s). Yes – you do detect a theme… my father’s birthday would have been at the start of April!

When I got outside these ‘guys’ were already there!

Tags: Fuji x10, Gardens, Photo, Spring

Island life

March 28, 2016 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

I liked this little sequence of images. The truck crane is used on the smaller islands for building projects and all concerned are so familiar with the procedure that the whole event took less than three minutes – following which tug, barge and truck disappeared in different directions.

Neat!

Tags: Boats, British Columbia, Fuji x10, Gulf Islands, Photo

Welcome to the cruise

March 21, 2016 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

The Canadian Power Squadron ‘Boating Essentials’ course that is occupying a fair percentage of my time at the moment is fast approaching its culmination. This Sunday last found those of us taking the course – along with our proctors and other members of the Brentwood Bay squadron and of the Royal Canadian Marine Search and Rescue service – participating in the student cruise… an opportunity to put into practice some of the theory that we have been studying these past several months in the classroom.

Courtesy of those generous owners/skippers upon whose vessels we were guests, we started early from Tsehum Harbour, north of Sidney.

The morning was spent working our way slowly north west from Sidney round the head of the peninsula and on towards Cowichan Bay. The object was to enable the students practice navigation the old-fashioned (pre-GPS) way.

Our reward for washing up at the correct location? Hot dogs from the barbecue at Genoa Bay courtesy of the squadron, which – thanks to the excellent tuition we have received throughout – was reached in good time for lunch.

This most welcome repast was followed by an opportunity to learn how to recover an unconscious ‘man overboard’ from the icy waters of the Pacific (kudos to the brave dry-suit clad volunteer from Search and Rescue for allowing herself repeatedly to be pushed into the dock!) before heading for home.

Potential recruits – or just after a ‘dog’?

Tools of the trade!

Tags: Boats, Gulf Islands, Photo, Victoria

…or studio?

March 5, 2016 in Flotsam and Jetsam, Photos | Permalink

As promised in my last post – herewith some images of how my studio/study has turned out. Needless to say – I am pretty dashed pleased with it.

The black things in the corners and on the side walls are bass traps, which I made from six inches of acoustic insulation covered with felt following one of many guides available on the InterWebNet. For those unfamiliar with such matters the idea is to try to produce a room that is as acoustically neutral as possible. No parts of the frequency spectrum should be exaggerated or diminished, reflections should be kept to a minimum and the layout of loudspeakers and listening position should be carefully calculated to avoid standing waves.

The little desk was already built in. I added the shelves.

Having lived for nearly two decades in apartments – however splendid they may have been – and thus having been restricted both in the amount of space available and the level of sound that could be produced without complaint, this is pretty much heaven! I have never before been in possession of a space large enough that I could dedicate it specifically to this end, and my gratitude that I finally am so knows no bounds.

The icing on the cake? This is what I see through the window from my desk!

Tags: Music, Studio, Writing

Farther up the shore

February 11, 2016 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

“The secret of success is to be in harmony with existence, to be always calm to let each wave of life wash us a little farther up the shore.”

Cyril Connolly

On a delightfully balmy mid-February day we parked the car on the outskirts of Sidney and walked along the seafront into the town. It was impossible not to marvel at the beauty of this exquisite enclave in which we are fortunate enough to reside. I therefore make no apologies for placing before the gentle reader – for his or her delectation – some selected snaps of this sumptuous shore.

Tags: Fuji x10, Luck, Photo, Victoria

Centennial Park

February 3, 2016 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

To Centennial Park in Saanichton the other day for a most pleasant stroll. The park has a deceptively ‘Tardis’ like quality about it and I have driven past it many a time without having the slightest notion of the manifold delights that lie within. On arrival the sky was dark and rain was threatening, so I decided that the Fuji x10 would not be needed and left it in the car. These images were captured instead on the Galaxy S6 – demonstrating quite how rubbish my judgement proved to be on this occasion.

Tags: Photo, Victoria

Rowena’s Inn on the River

January 4, 2016 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

We broke our Boxing Day journey up to snowy Kamloops (where the temperatures continue to be a bracing minus ten celsius!) at Harrison Mills, the which is situated toward the top of the broader part of the Fraser Valley between Mission and Hope (fabulous – no?) before one hits the mountains and takes to the canyon or to the high passes.

We spent a lovely night at Rowena’s Inn on the River which I cannot recommend highly enough to travellers in these parts. This beautiful old lodge is still owned by the Pretty family who built it (their history being revealed in photos throughout the house) and who now run it as a boutique B & B with a really rather good restaurant alongside to boot. Apart from anything else the place is clearly a twitchers’ paradise (see below)!

As ever – here be some photos…

Tags: British Columbia, Fuji x10, Photo, winter

Season’s greetings…

December 24, 2015 in Life as we know it, Photos | Permalink

…to friends, acquaintances and gentle readers…

from the Kickass Canada Girl and the Imperceptible Immigrant.

Have a wonderful Christmas and a splendid Hogmany!

Tags: Celebration, Christmas, Fuji x10, Photo

Cheers!

December 18, 2015 in Life in BC, Photos | Permalink

Here follows an extract from an article on the website ‘thedrinksbusiness.com‘ dating from October 2014:

“Luc Heymans was so shocked by the price of wine in Ireland that he opened up Europe’s first craft wine-making shop in Kells, County Meath, reported the Irish Examiner.

Speaking to the Irish Examiner, Heymans explained his rationale: “When I lived in Europe, I used to enjoy a glass of wine with my dinner, but when I moved to Ireland I couldn’t believe the price of a bottle of wine. I started making my own wine and then I decided to open the shop. There are thousands of similar stores in Canada but this is the first in Europe,” Heymans said.

Unlike similar offerings in the UK, the wines are made with kits rather than on demand from a winery and customers can buy the kits and take them home to make the wine or leave them in the shop throughout the process.

Heymans said: “The wine takes between four and eight weeks to ferment, depending on the quality you choose and, when it’s ready, the customer comes back into the shop to bottle and cork it and add personalised labels.”

“They then take the wine home and leave it to rest for a few months and each kit makes between 28 and 30 bottles,” he said.”

Since being introduced a decade ago (by the Kickass Canada Girl, naturally) to the splendid wines from the Okanagan Valley and elsewhere in BC, I have become a massive fan of Canadian wines. I had no idea – however – that Canadians were also as enthusiastic about making their own wines, whether from kits (which bear absolutely no resemblance to the ‘Boots the Chemist’ home wine kits that I remember from my youth) or from their own produce.

Shortly after our arrival in the province we were introduced to a local winemaker – the wonderful ‘Flying Fish Winery‘ in Saanichton. I was immediately knocked out both by the cost of the wines per bottle (a little over £3 in English money!) and the amazing quality of the product. We instantly ordered four different half kits – a Sauvignon Blanc, a Gewurztraminer, an Amarone and a Carménère – and a couple of weeks ago were told that they were ready for bottling.

You might – incidentally – recognise the symbol on our labels. Yes – it is the Luckenbooth!

With regard to the bottling process I think these pictures tell their own story: