The Squamidian Report – May 16 / 09
Issue #364
Including:
The Ontarion
Hi All,
Well, here I go talking about bikes again…. Ryan and I had a chance to take off for the weekend on our Harleys, so we did! Who could blame us?
Sue departed last Saturday morning with her sister and parents on a cruise ship headed for Alaska so that meant that we had the weekend to ourselves to do with as we saw fit. Like a trip up the Sunshine Coast and over to Vancouver Island on the bikes. The Sunshine Coast is part of mainland BC but is only accessible by water or air, there are no roads into the area. The terrain is simply too steep and severe to make roads possible. However, once there, there are three small towns and several villages all connected by Highway 101.
We saddled up and left Squamish about mid morning and pulled in to Horseshoe Bay in time to catch a ferry over to Langdale, just outside of Gibsons. One neat thing about taking a ferry when on a bike, you go right to the front of the line when boarding, and you get off first as well. Just the way it should be. You may remember Gibsons from the old CBC TV show ‘The Beach Combers’. We checked out the wharf and other attractions including Molly’s Reach. It had been a fake restaurant in the TV show, now it is open as a real restaurant. From Gibsons we headed on up the coast to Sechelt where we grabbed some lunch. The highway hugs the coast and the towns all face the open St of Georgia. The highway is very winding and demands full attention from anyone driving or riding it. Most of it is posted at 80k but you’d be hard pressed to do more than 50 in most places. The Sunshine Coast has some of the nicest stands of Arbutus trees I’ve seen and the flavour of the land is similar to the east coast of Vancouver Island. The area reminds me of Northern Ontario in many ways.
We continued to follow Highway 101 up through the Sechelt Peninsula to Earls Cove where it just stops at a dock. There is a ferry that crosses from Earls Cove to Saltery Bay but it is not timed to work at all with the other ferries. There is no way of traveling along there without having to wait to do the crossing but that’s OK if you are not in a hurry. We weren’t and so were able to enjoy a leisurely ride without any rushing or concerns about missing the ferry.
The ferry crosses Jervis Inlet. When we were about half way across we spotted a pod of killer whales swimming along. First time I’ve ever seen them in the wild from the deck of a BC ferry. Pretty cool I must say. From Saltery Bay on up to Powell River is another leisurely ride along the twisty highway. Once in Powell River we fuelled up, grabbed some supper and then caught the ferry over to Comox on Vancouver Island. The sun went down as we were making crossing the St of Georgia giving us a spectacular sunset. By the time we docked it was dark and had gotten quite chilly but it was a short 15-minute ride into Courtenay and the motel we use whenever we are there.
The next morning (Sunday) we headed up to Campbell River, staying on the Old Island Highway (19A). A new, faster, modern highway was build further inland several years ago to move traffic faster but the old route follows the coast and is more enjoyable. We walked out onto the Discovery Peer and enjoyed the view over to Quadra Island and then rode a bit further into town. By the way, Campbell River sits right on the 50th parallel line, in case you are interested. We followed the Old route back down-island to Qualicum Beach and then headed west on #4 to Cathedral Grove. Never get tired of looking at those trees. We grabbed a bit of lunch just east of Cameron Lake on our way into Nanaimo where we caught a ferry back to Horseshoe bay.
An hour later we were home, we’d had a great father and son weekend of riding. Can’t wait for the next run.
I’ve posted some pictures along with this same story on my web site at:
http://www.thedougsite.net/R&D-09/sunshine1.htm
doug
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ONTARION REPORT
Hello
everyone!
Hope
things are going well for all of you Squamidian members out there!
A few
weeks ago I was talking with a friend of mine about antiques and antique toys
etc. He’s the eldest son of a friend of mine. His dad was the lead guitar
player in a band I used to sing in when we were in high school. We weren’t very
good and I think that after practicing
in our drummer’s basement for a year and a half we managed to play three
gigs in total. It was one helluva lot of work for the pitiful financial reward
we reaped in the end! LOL! We did however have a lot of fun doing it and I’m
sure the other members look back on it with fondness just as I do! We were
called “Tailor Made” and we’ve all gone on to become world famous musicians as
you can imagine! LOL!
Well, to
get back to my computerized conversation with Frank Chatterson’s son Dave about
the antique toys, we talked for about an hour on line. I told him that when his
dad and I were kids, we used to play with something called a Meccano Set! This
I’m sure if you’re over 50 years of age will ring a bell with many of you
Squids!
After I
told Dave about this wonderful building set he proceeded to tell me that he had
tons of Lego blocks from different sets he had received for Christmas and other
occasions when he was a kid. He has a “barrel full of Lego” as he put it and
decided to pull it out of storage one evening when he was bored. He is a very
talented guitar player and has a collection of vintage guitars. It just so
happened that on the evening he was bored enough to dig out his Lego he decided
to build something interesting. At least, something interesting to him! He
spent that evening and a few more planning and sorting out his Lego parts to
make sure he had enough of the right items to build his project. After spending
a week or more on the project, he had completed it and sent me pictures of it.
The project was a Lego model of a classic 60’s Fender Amplifier.
I was
amazed at the detail he managed to build into this plastic Lego Amp! He also
sent along pictures of an actual “Real” Fender Amp of the exact model he built!
I
complimented him on his project and said jokingly that he should sell it to
Fender Company to use in their advertising! Well, he said he knew of a guitar
player that used only Fender Amps of this very model when he played and is a
famous guitarist.
Dave sent
me a couple of websites for videos of this guy playing and he truly is an
amazing guitarist and the amp he was using and promotes for Fender Company was
on these videos with him. Dave sent an e-mail to this artist along with some
pictures of his “Lego” amp and actually got a response from the guy. He said he
was in touch with his contacts at Fender Co and they wanted to do an interview
with Dave about his Lego amp. I told Dave to let me know if anything came of
this guy’s idea. Well, today I received an e-mail from Dave telling me that
Fender contacted him and indeed DID conduct the interview and published it in
their monthly Fender News Letter! He included the website for the Fender
article about him and I would like to pass it on to all of my fellow
Squamidians to honour Dave, a very fine musician and an accomplished LEGO
artist! He’s proud of his accomplishment and I am proud of Dave both as a fine
young man and a very very good guitarist as well as a LEGO Aritst!
Way to go
Dave and congratulations on your new found fame! Maybe he’ll be asked to do
promotion work for Fender now that they have discovered him, ya never know!
Here’s
the Fender website and Dave’s interview: Hope you all enjoy it!
http://www.fender.com/news/index.php?display_article=314
That’s it for tonight folks!
Thanks for tuning in and I look forward to talking to you all again next
week in The Ontarion report!
Bye for now…. Greg.
PS: Something To Think About>
What might you find if you go digging in your attic some night when
you’re bored?
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Have a good one..
the doug
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