Sunday, August 06, 2006


An alternative method of getting to Tofino. The views on the way over would be spectacular.

When we arrived in Tofino, Candace and I, equally struck by the horror of the place, searched for somewhere to eat. We found a restaurant just above this seaplane dock. Ah, the joys of eavesdropping on our fellow tourists. Once lunch was over, we blew town and headed for Long Beach so that Shadow, Candace's dog, could get a good sprint along the sand. But, more of that later....

For now, I want to cut to the end of the adventure. During the course of the day, we managed to travel a little over 300 km, have a couple of nice meals, frolic on the beach (well, Shadow, the dog, frolicked), and do some high-speed sight-seeing. All in the course of about 8 hours. In other words, everything went like clockwork. And then...

My return to Vancouver involves an approximately 90 minute trip on the ferry, and another hour or so negotiating various buses to home. Normally. I should have known I was in trouble when the ferry was not only on time, it was early! "Early" has never been B.C. Ferries' long suit.

I boarded and found myself a "comfy" (in B.C. Ferry terms that is) chair and settled in. Then came the first announcement. Someone's car's steering had locked, and we were going to be delayed for a few minutes while the car was towed off the boat. O.K., no big deal. Ten minutes, tops. I had my MP3 player plugged in, and a magazine to read - what did I care?

Then came the next announcement. A medical emergency. A doctor was attending the patient, and making an assessment as to the possible necessity of taking the person off by ambulance. Hmmmm....the delay could be longer. But, no! All in all, we were only delayed about 20 minutes. Fine. Home a little later, but still...This, by the by, is all happening at 9:30 p.m.

Having snoozed away most of the trip (nothing to see - it's dark out), I came to just as we were approaching the dock. Perfect. I grabbed my pack and headed below decks to where my mighty chariot - a Greyhound bus - awaited. 25 minutes to downtown Vancouver, 20 more to catch a city bus to my neighbourhood - I was as good as home.

We get on the Upper Levels Highway where traffic is moving at a crawl. And keeps moving at a crawl. And keeps moving at a crawl. And so on until we finally reach our exit about 45 minutes later. Yes, there'd been some sort of traffic accident. But, at last we were free! Zip down Taylor Way, drop off some passengers at the bottom, and head for the Lions Gate Bridge to town. Over it and into Stanley Park. And, again, traffic stops. Then crawls. Then stops. Then crawls. I had overlooked one small detail in my travel plans. This was a "fireworks" night. It was after midnight, and crowds were still leaving downtown Vancouver after the big display on English Bay and traffic was a mess. A distance that's normally covered in 10 minutes was converted into a seemingly-endless grind.

So, to get to the end of all this, I finally got home at two in the morning. Tired? Me? You darn betcha!

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