How I'm Spending my Summer Vacation

It's been way too long since I've done stuff other than work on my vacation. Our crew took 3 weeks off and I'm trying to make the best of it. On Monday I went for a nice long ride up on the mountain and it felt great! I think that the last off road ride I took was over 6 months ago, but I was feeling strong. I went for almost 3 hours and hit a lot of trails. No pics, though. I was having too much fun to stop.

Yesterday was a highlight. I walked from our beach all the way to Ford Cove along the coast.

	The walk starts as gentle and easy treking along some featured sandstone. I picked low tide as a time because I knew that there would be some scrambing under boulders a bit further on.
	There are plenty of opportunities for bouldering along the way. Problems range from easy stuff that even I can climb in my crocs to some completely horizontal roof problems. The rock is surprisingly solid for cobble.
	The cooperative community of Downes Point is fascinating from the water. This is how one resident has extended his studio deck out over the cliff. I might have been tempted to use a combination of cantilevering and some diagonal back bracing, but whatever floats your boat.
	This coastline is probably the least traveled bit of coast on the entire island with, I'm guessing, maybe 2 or 3 traverses per year. Once around the Downes Point corner, I saw no one until I got to Heron Rocks a couple of hours later.
	The cobble boulders eventually give way to clean sandstone and the remains of an old quarry where the sandstone that was used for the provincial legislation building was mined. On the other side of the sandstone in this picture, there are house sized sandstone boulders leaning up again each other at the base of a vertical cliff.
	The tops of some of these boulders have the amazing featured sandstone which is quite unique to the southern gulf islands.
	The boulder scrambling gives way to the extensive shelves beneath the Olsen Farm. For anyone who's been to a Hornby Festival show or a fall faire, that big field in which they take place is just above these shelves.

Another 30 minutes or so got me to the store at Ford Cove where I started to hitchhike back home. Three cars went by before someone picked me up and drove me to within 100 meters of our house.

At times it's a pretty scrambly walk but anyone who is interested in spending a couple of hours on some of the most amazing coast on the inside passage should check it out. It'd be a great outing on a crisp winter day, too. Come on up, stay a few days with us, and lets go walking.