no it's not - the driftwood here really is that big....
Heading back towards Victoria, we stopped in at French Beach Provincial Park. The beach is a 'cobble beach' of large rounded stones and can be quite challenging to walk on, and is dotted with giant driftwood.... The boys came across some giant kelp.... "Whoa, this is cool!" They tried to pull some up the beach.... Watching for whales, but didn't see any... And just in case you think the driftwood is way out of scale to the dolls in the photos above,
no it's not - the driftwood here really is that big.... After spending the night in Victoria, we decided the next morning to check out the southwest coast along the Strait of Juan de Fuca. It's a very rugged coast with very limited access. We went only as far as River Jordon, since the road goes inland after that. The tide was out, and the kids started building stone sculptures out of the smooth, flat stones.... The girls decided to climb on some of the large driftwood... Hundreds of seagulls were perched along the rocks at the water's edge... like a line of white dots along the edge of the beach.... When the rising water would cover the rock they were standing on, they'd fly off and find a new dry rock a little further from the water. Coco and Holly enjoyed watching them.... When Jan got too close, they ALL took off......
Early Monday morning found us on the ferry to Vancouver Island. The trip from Departure Bay in Vancouver, to Discovery Bay in Nanaimo takes just over an hour and a half. The sun hadn't even risen over the trees yet, as Leona and Coco checked out the marina from the upper deck.... We are on the Coastal Renaissance, the largest ship in British Columbia's fleet of ferries.... While the ferry is loading vehicles, it's fine to be out on the open deck, but once it started sailing across the Strait of Georgia, it got way too windy, so we went up front where it's sheltered It looks like it will be a nice day.... When we reach Naniamo, we take a short drive along the coast along the water.... I forgot just how big the driftwood can be here. Lonny and Holly climb up on a rock, as the ferry heads back out into the Strait, back to Vancouver.
We arrived in Vancouver's Stanley Park, with it's great view of the city, late in the afternoon... I love the Totem pole collection at Brockton Point, but with the sun so low in the sky, the lighting through the trees was very blotchy, and not the best for photos. But I had to make the best of it... Lonnie explained that many of the poles tell stories.... Coco liked the birds on the tops of several of the poles. "What kind of bird is that?" ""It's a Thunderbird. They are very powerful, magical birds. There's another Thunderbird." "Look, I'm a Thunderbird!" "I'm one too!" We stayed to watch the sun set... ... and the lights of the city go on....
After leaving the Vermillion Lakes, we headed to lake Louise, but with it being a Saturday, and the sky beginning to clear, it was crazy busy. So much so that anyone wanting to go to Moraine Lake was told to go park in the overflow campground along the Trans-Canada Hwy, and take a shuttle bus. Forget that! So we decided to take a short drive up the Icefields Parkway to Bow Lake instead. We skipped the pull-off along the Hwy, thinking we'd catch that later, and went straight to the Num-Ti-Jah Lodge.... Even with the sky clearing a bit, it was very cold and windy, so just Holly and Coco came out for a quick picture. We headed back to the south end of the lake. "This looks like a good spot for our picnic" But it was extremely cold and windy, and impossible to lay out a picnic.... It started to snow, so we packed up, and left. We continued west, through the mountains, into Glacier National Park. Here we come to the end of the first set of trip photos.
I've made an album in Favourite Photos - Fall Trip - Part 1 - Heading West - where you can revisit the trip without having to scroll through my Blog And for anyone interested in seeing more of the scenery pictures, I've also started a Trip Album - Pacific 2015 - on my Martha Boers website. That album has more scenery shots, but fewer doll photos. Right now they are almost the same, as I'm updating both albums at the same time, but further into our trip there will times when there are photos of places we visited and didn't take any doll photos. We went away for the weekend, but before we left on Friday, we took an hour to go back up into the country and take a few more doll photos. I'd thought of doing a series of Lily in her 'Summer Goddess' costume, leaving on her horse as autumn encircled her. I'd made some trim for my horse, and hoped the mid-week storms hadn't stripped the trees of all their leaves. The trees had far less leaves than when we went a few days earlier, but still enough for the effect I wanted. I loved how the pictures turned out, and started playing with different effects in an attempt to make the photos look like old-fashioned, romantic paintings, with hazy atmosphere... I think I need to create an album with both versions of all the photos,
since it's hard to decide which style I prefer. It was five years ago today, that this website went online! It's hard to believe it's only been five years. Seems like a lot longer! Back then I had just two BJDs - my Elfdoll Ryung, and my first Narae. Since then a lot more have moved in - I won't say how many. I guess you could go looking through my photos and add them all up. So far I've kept everyone I've purchased, with the sole exception of the Soom Cuprit, whose head I sold after I replaced it with an Elfdoll Hazy.
What's ahead for the coming year? I have no idea, and don't really want to speculate, since I'd pretty much be repeating the same spiel I gave the last couple of years. What I'd 'like to do' and what actually gets done don't seem to be the same thing anymore. So I guess it will just be a surprise. |
AuthorMartha Boers is an award-winning Canadian doll maker and costumer specializing in fantasy and historical-style costumes. Archives
May 2024
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