Greencrow update + Tofino Holiday album

Good morning beloved sentients. As you may have gathered by now I have been away from my laptop for a few days. Last Tuesday morning, my husband, I, my son, his wife and the two granddaughters, left driving in two cars north to Tofino, at the top of Vancouver island for a small 3 day vacay. The formal purpose of the trip was to explore the concept of sandcastle-building with the children. To set the stage, first, we stopped at Parksville, BC north of the City of Nanaimo and went to the World Famous Sandcastle Building Competition and Exhibition–that goes on all summer long on the beach in Parksville.

Parksville, Sandcastle Exhibition

Parksville Beach was where I and the girls first got our hands dirty, so to speak, building our first sandcastles. On Wednesday morning, we drove to Butterfly World just outside of Parksville and spent the afternoon admiring the colourful array of large, beautiful and exotic butterflies in the enclosed terrarium there. The exhibition also displays a Koi Pond and huge friendly turtles.

Butterfly World near Coumbs, BC

Tofino, BC

Continuing our trip on Wednesday afternoon, a couple of hours drive through the steep mountains of the northern Vancouver Island Interior in a driving rain brought us out to the West Coast of Vancouver Island…and the northern seaside town of Tofino, BC. Our hotel, Hotel Zed, is an eight month old hotel, built next to coastal ocean mud flats that are edged by a cedar forest. Built in the now trendy mid-century modern style, it is a ‘state of the art’ hotel.

Folks my age will remember this mid-century modern design style from the 1950’s and 60’s. But the Hotel Zed Hotel Chain builders have taken midcentury modern to the ‘nth degree. Even old dial-up telephones in the suites. More about the hotel later. Outside, exposed to the elements, in the Hotel’s back courtyard, was an old “woody” VW made entirely out of driftwood. Built to exact scale–with doors you can open and enter the the cab. Even the engine, visible upon opening the engine hood at the back, was an exact replica made out of driftwood.

The driftwood theme was especially appropriate to me–because I’d already decided to call the little covered outside bar we’re building in the Pergola at our Malahat cabin “The Driftwood Pub“. When I was banned from going to bars and restaurants during the “Lockdown” phase of the HOAX, I vowed to build our own pub which is now almost complete.

I’m currently in the middle of doing a sign for this pub–a sign which I had already decided to frame with pieces of driftwood. So I brought a bag with me to Tofino in which to collect small pieces of driftwood off the beaches. When I’m finished our Pub sign, I’ll display it on this blog. Regular readers know I don’t drink alcohol anymore…but I still deeply resented not being able to enter such public venues.

Additionally, it’s been a very long time since I have displayed any of my arts and crafts on this blog. That used to be a regular feature. Two and a half years ago, at the start of the CovIDian Cult BS, when they closed the seniors woodworking studio that I attended in Coquitlam, sadly, my arts and crafts activities dried up.

But, I digress.

Long Beach, BC

Copied here are two small glimpses of Long Beach at Tofino. Long Beach is 16 km [10 miles] long, so it’s nearly impossible to capture in one photo. When we were there it was ideal conditions. Sunny, with a warm summer breeze and not particularly crowded.

While the rest of the family strolled for a couple of kilometers down the beach, I sat on a log and prepared to build our masterpiece sandcastle. Harkening back to my childhood on Mulligan Beach on Lake Ramsey in Sudbury, Ontario, I filled up the big bucket with sand, poked holes in the sand with a long stick and then poured seawater into the holes. When the family came back from their walk, we flipped the bucket over. After banging on the top a few times, it came out perfect. A second story was added and patted down. Finally, a razor clamshell was added as a garnish to the top. The end result looked like a rabbit. We called it our “Rabbit Hotel”. Mission completed, and all having quite enough sun, we retreated back to our real hotel for a delicious meal of wood grilled oysters and baba ganoush seated out on the hotel restaurant patio.

Thursday afternoon we drove to Ucluelet, BC just south of Tofino.

Ucluelet, BC Dockside Aquarium

Thursday afternoon we went to the small first nations fishing village of Ucluelet. Fishing is no longer an industry, due to the ongoing and escalating devastation of salmon stocks. One of the old time fish cleaning/canning plants on the Wharf of Ucluelet has been transformed into a lovely “catch and release” aquarium, where tourists and especially children can come and learn about the inhabitants of the ocean around us.

Our final meal was at the family restaurant “Howlers” in Ucluelet. Afterwards. we returned to Hotel Zed for a good night sleep–before the long drive home the next morning.

As I was saying earlier, Hotel Zed is a state-of-the-art Hotel less than a year old. All I can say is, some deep pocketed persons must be laundering a lot of money in Tofino, BC because there are a lot of such newly built Hotel Resorts just opened up–in spite of the travel restrictions of the past two years.

We observed that, while no amount of money was spared on the building of the hotel, it proved to be deeply unfunctional in the guest comfort department. The bathrooms all had huge glass doored showers with rain shower heads–but no hooks to hang towels on–or places to even put our watches! Our room did not even have a small desk that I could set up my laptop on and blog. Ergo, no blogging–which may have been a good thing, as I needed a break. The specialty “diffuser” coffee maker came with its own instruction manual…that needed to be closely consulted before a cup of coffee was to be enjoyed in the morning.

While we were less than impressed with the hotel–we were shocked when we got the bill for the two-night stay for two rooms. Prior to the bullshit Covid Cult Plandemic, we could have taken a Caribbean Vacation, complete with airfare, for the same price!

Suffice it to say, these hotel resorts will not be in business long. Nobody can afford these prices except perhaps the 400 or so billionaires that have emerged in North America since the “controlled demolition” of our economy began. We certainly will not be taking another such luxurious vacation. I’m already thinking of alternatives for lodging.

Still, I don’t regret the vacation or the expenditure. You cannot put a price on memories…especially when children are involved...a vacation for children is one of the best lifetime investments a family can make. Also, it was a real eye-opener as to how the travel/vacation landscape has been forever altered by the Plandemic HOAX. Only the rich can now travel the way we were once ALL once accustomed to. As I always say: knowledge is power. Stay tuned.