Fishin On The Wild West Coast

I have conceded, there is no better place in existence to end a trip around the world than Vancouver Island. The rugged west coast; with picturesque snowcapped mountains rising from the still black waters of the Queen Charlotte Strait. The destination; Telegraph Cove on the interior stretch of the Island, our reason; to fish. To drop hooks into the cold depths of the North Pacific Ocean and pull out the monsters of the deep, halibut and salmon.

My father Gordon decided after a long winter working in northern Alberta to fly my brother Damian, brother in law, Terry and myself to this tiny inlet for two solid days of world class sport fishing.

We all met in Comox and by the time we finished the drive to our cabin three hours later we had seen, two deer, several eagles, an otter, two black bears and two doll porpoises. Anybody reading this from overseas that is thinking about heading to Canada to check out the wildlife, Vancouver Island is your place. It is teaming with all the icons of the west coast, so mark it up on your bucket list at the end of this sentence.

Our first day of fishing could be described as an average day for somebody who lives here but for a bunch of boys from Alberta it was freaking great. In less than two hours we had caught our limit of halibut (4 fish) which turned out to be 50 lbs of meat. Approximately every 10 minutes another giant fish was coming over the side of the boat and the sound of the Hong Kong Gong rang out into the morning to announce to all within ear shot that yes we've got yet another fish!

The big winner was Terry who had never caught a fish until yesterday, his 36th birthday. By the end he had landed four for the boat, lucky bastard. I got skunked, no fish for me. On the way in we check the local crab pots to find 7 crabs waiting to be introduced to our stove top.

Day two started out with us fishing for salmon. The down riggers went on and the lines were dropped to 90 feet. Within minutes the rod tip wiggled, and the reel started to wind out, we had a fish. I did my best to push everybody out of the way. After the big fat zero count for me on day one, this lunker was mine. We battled, (I reeled and he fought minorly) ten minutes later I had a 8.5 lbs chinook salmon to whack on the head. Here is my proof.

This turned out to be the only fish for the day. I almost landed a halibut later on but it skipped the hooked with only 30 feet to the surface. The other major highlight was Gordy spilling his guts into sea (chumming) as the water was a bit bumpy with a slight wind out of the northwest. No photo proof but you get the idea.

On the way in we again check the crab pots to find fifteen more of the ugly tasty crustacean. Supper was a rich west coast boil of fresh crab. I never get excited about a meal, but this one was bloody delicious.

After dinner we went for a walk amongst the forest giants. The ambition, gather some souvenir drift wood from the beach. Knowing full well that bears were in the area, we loaded up the Hong Kong Gong and set out down the trail making heaps of noise to scare away anything that could potential eat us. Gong! Gong! Went the Hong Kong Gong.

Seconds before reaching the beach we came atop a fallen log to look ahead and see two bear cubs 100ft ahead and partially up a tree. Their eyes were locked into us and our into theirs. We then shifted to the local surroundings looking for Mama. She wasn't around so we quickly exited the area. The only thing those bears cubs saw next was our backs, and the only thing they heard was the sound of the Hong Kong Gong getting fainter and fainter. My heart was up in my throat and I wasn't the only one in our group to need new and “fresher” shorts. In the end we could laugh about it, but it is easily the closest I have been to a bear, without my normal protection of a Honda Prelude.

As I sit on the plane and head back to Alberta in can reflect. The west coast rules, I love it here and when the fish bite it makes it a lot easier to build a case for moving here. It is definitely on my short list, just wish the sea wasn't so bloody cold here...

Check out the Slide show below.

Collingwood, Ontario

The last few days have been spent on Georgian Bay in Collingwood, Ontario with Andis folks. Jealous of our time overseas they wanted to get in on the action, so they rented out a place and we packed up Jeepers the Jeep for some backyard exploring. Just because we are back in Canada doesn't mean the traveling is done.

Our days in Collingwood were filled with searching out the local history, usually in the form of old waterfalls and the century old mills that used to flank them. Grey County used to be home to several old mills that would produce anything from flour to lumber to wool. Unfortunately, most are now relics fallen to the naturally harsh elements of the Canadian seasons. That said I am still very impressed with what man can build with his own bare hands, these old mills are a testament to the pioneering spirit that helped shape our nation over a century ago.

Other local highlights was the shale bed beach, home to the fossilized remains of prehistoric trilobites and other critters. In my opinion the shale beach was a perfect place to build a rock tower, so I did.
The resort we stayed in also had a kick ass mini-putt. Built and shaped in the fashion of a real course this mini-putt had it all, real green grass, sand traps and water hazards. Peter, Andis father, managed to harness the power of the planets and scored a hole in one, which he humbly held over the rest of us for the remainder of the weekend.

The few days spent on the freshwater coast was relaxing for us, all of us. It was a fantastic opportunity for me to get to know Peter and Karen, Andis mother, a little bit better.

As Andi and I feasted on the foods we missed so dearly we all crowded around the computer and watched the slide show of our photos, all 2800 of them. Even though we broke them up over four nights its was still a freaking marathon. Kudos to Peter and Karen for sticking through it, I don't know how you made it through picture after picture of high kicks in foreign lands. You both do a very good “Oh yes, very interesting” face!!

Cheers to the two of you for the great week in Collingwood and for making us feel at home after a long journey to the four corners of the earth. Oh yah, Peter, with the power of seventeen black Arabian horses, the cellulose busting power of your log splitter kicks royal ass!!! Be very proud of that purchase, very proud!!

Familiar Ground

Placing your feet back on familiar soil is always bittersweet after traveling for so long. That said stepping off a plane and being able to see, smell and feel things that seem correct is unexplainable. The unnerving feeling of the unknown is gone, you know how the system works here, no time is lost trying to figure things out and your surroundings finally feel normal. Well somewhat normal I guess.

Your views of the homeland will never be the same. The insight gathered over your time away in foreign territories will only enhance and broaden your appreciation of the things that you missed and the conveniences you take for granted. On the flip side it will also make you wonder why certain elements of life can't be different to reflect what you witnessed in some far off island state in the Pacific. But I guess that what travel does to a person. It forces you to grow, whether or not you are ready for it.

It forces you to face what ever the hell challenge stands in your way; good, bad or ugly. It pushes you beyond the confines of your normal world and acceptance of that is fundamental to success. I will say that we succeeded, we both grew individually and together. We completed our trip around the world and now we are back in Canada.

A land where looking to your left you can see a middle aged man wearing a Coors Light ball cap and to your right a car slows to stop as a pedestrian steps onto the street. A place where you can smell Tim Horton's coffee wafting on the air currents of the airport arrival hall. The sounds of Burton Cummings and Randy Bachman come streaming across the radio as you listen to a man from North Bay, Ontario tell you about a friend of his who has a pet Moose. And you believe this man because you grew up here, you know that however absurd it sounds it is probably true. It is a region of our planet that oozes Canadiana and I would have it no other way. All that said, most importantly it is a place where you can reach out and touch family and friends.

Being back in Canada is remarkable because your surroundings no longer feel strange, you can make a joke about Newfoundland and people are gonna laugh. Simply put it's home, and there is no place like it.

Dining Displeasures

Does Karma have a moral consciences? Is it possible to build up the Karma bank with good deeds, knowing full well that a premeditated bad deed was on the horizon? Are there rules to Karma? We let me back up a few days and fill you in.

Whilst cruising and shopping in the fine city of Amsterdam I was getting hungry. I figured a cone of go fries would be the perfect snack for me. Perfect to stroll along with and watch the world go by would be great. So we looked and looked and looked but no chip shop, but we did see a Pannekoek house. Andy B-lined it for the front door and in we went. What we did not realize was that our meal would turn out to be our biggest rip off of this entire trip. Two pints of Heineken and two cheese and bacon pannekoeks cost us 30 farking Euros, that is approximately 45 CAD. I was pissed, fully taken advantage of by the local pancake jerk.

Fast Forward 30 hours and again we were hungry and looking for a feed. We did manage to find a Argentinian restaurant with a few specials on so in we went.

Dion: What are the specials we saw on the board on the way in?

Waiter: We have a 200g Sirloin on special, ribs and lasagna, the chicken and fish are done for the night.

Andi: I'll have the steak.

Dion: I'll have the ribs.

The food comes a few moments later and on we ate, the steak was nowhere near being cooked correctly. I asked Andi if she wanted to send it back but she shrugged it off not wanting to be an inconvenience. The bill arrived as we went to leave and the steak was listed as 16 Euro. I knew something was not right as I remember the specials board outside did not have anything that expensive on it. So I went out and checked and sure enough the steak was listed as 11 Euro.

Simple mistake I figured and took the bill up to the bar to sort it out. When we presented the issue to the man and he instantly put up a defensive stance as i how dare I question the tab. He kept on stating that we had ate a very good sirloin steak on special and it cost 16 Euro. I told him about the sign outside, the 200g steak for 11 Euro etc. This went on for a while until I took the man outside and pointed at the sign and said "Look 200g steak, 11 Euros you're ripping me off."

The man then pointed to a tiny sign way up in the back corner of the patio, out of the way which said 200g sirloin steak, 16 Euros and then stated the 11 Euro steak was a "Rump steak" not as good.

Well the major stand off started here, as we were obviously being screwed with and we weren't happy, especially with the pannekoek incident still fresh in our mind. We then started to argue back in the restaurant and he offered, very kindly as he put it, to lower our bill by one Euro to 30. We rightfully owed him 26 and then offered to pay 27 being the change we had in our pockets. It was a matter of principle at this point knowing full well that he was trying to snake us.

After 5 minutes of heated arguments Andi said thats it and left the restaurant. Well the fat man behind the counter lost his mind and ran out to try and block her. I have never seen a fat guy (think George Costanza from Seinfeld) move so quickly. Andi got out the door so the bastard then gets up in my face and starts to threaten me. He pushed his face with beatty eyes pulsing to the beat of his heart inches from my face. He was not going to let me leave until he got his 3 Euro. Then he shouts over to our waiter and tells him to call the cops. At this point I was so pissed, I threw the extra 3 Euro at him just so I wouldn't hit him and left. I was shaking for a couple of hours after the incident.

We had been ripped off and it wasn't fair, so I went back 2 nights later after they closed and threw 3 eggs at restaurant, symbolic of the 3 Euros he was ready to fight and call the cops for. I hope it takes him three days to get the yokes off of the front door. He deserved every bit of it. We left Europe the next morning.

Holland - the other part

If there is one thing the rest of the world could learn from Holland it is public transport. They easy win the best public transport system award from me, which isn't an internationally recognized award yet, but I am working on it. From trains, trams and buses it was super easy to travel within a city and beyond.

One afternoon we decided to, at the advice of several others, get out of Amsterdam for a day and see some of the country side and the other cities and towns that are nearby. We got a day pass for the both of us for 40 Euro, which enables us to ride any train in Holland for the entire day. So we did, we took a day and explored The best thing about this exploration was the frequency of the trains at the stations. I don't think we waited for more than 5 minutes any time we wanted to move to the next town.

So first up was a small town with a huge cathedral and windmills called Harleem. We did a quick lap, took some photos had a coffee and got the hell out and headed to Den Hague. Nice town though.



Den Hague is the center of a lot of international focus, mostly because it is the location of the International Court. It is mostly a government town and it was pretty quite being a Saturday. We didn't stay long but we did get this photo which exhibits the amount of bikes there...


The next stop was Utrecht. This was a very neat town with canals. These canals are similar to the ones in Amsterdam but they have terraces down at water level which house restaurants. We stopped in for a couple of beers and watch all the boats and kayaks cruise by. It was really neat to be surrounded by the medieval cathedrals and Gothic buildings while sinking down a Heineken.


From Utrecht it was off to Rotterdam. Neat city but no photos to prove it. Mostly it is a brand new city, by comparison as the entire centre of town was leveled during the second world war. It is the architectural leader of Holland and was quite a pleasant surprise (modern buildings) when the only thing we had seen in the last three weeks was old old old.

We had dinner a few drinks and got back on the train to head home to Amsterdam. Great day out and we covered a heap of ground. Lots of fun!!!

Amsterdam

Amsterdam is a beautiful city. After spending a night in the airport in Rome sleeping on benches made of steel and worn out padding it was nice to arrive in a place that seemed a little closer to home. Let me explain, Amsterdam is still Europe, but moving around via public transport is ten times easier when you can read the the maps and instructions and ask question sin english, which means that getting to the hotel is expedited and the bullshit is cut and I can nap in a real bed quicker.

And what a hotel we had. Really I am going to credit the fond memories I take from this city to the comfortable hotel. It was clean, super helpful staff and you got two fried eggs for breakfast. Really it blew most super eights out of the water. We liked it so much that we stayed for the entire week. That decision was also influenced by our desire not to lug our back packs around anymore, as they are heavy and quite full of god knows what. We enjoyed staying still after being on the move for so long. And as I stated above, Amsterdam is a beautiful city so it was an easy place to stick around.

Cruising European cities is fun. You never seem to be in a car, mostly on foot but in the case of this city you get bikes.

We got our bicycles for a few days and covered a heap of ground. We saw the sites, Vondelpark, the canals, the Van Gogh museum, pubs and coffee shops. It was just a nice and cruisey week to end our trip in Europe. Amsterdam was a shopping mecca, if you had all the cash in the world you could probably get rid of it there in a hurry. We didn't have much money so we just got tipsy at the pubs and watch people inclusive of the good and bad street performers.

We even saw one street performer, a fire dancer, that was so horrible it reminded me of GOB from Arrested Development, he did not get any of my spare Euros.

Once we had enough to drink we would take a walk through the Red Light District and get into some serious people watching. A sleazy, yet heavily controlled so you felt safe, area full of all walks of life. I have seen some different places in my 30 years but this zone of sin again is an eye opener. Our favorite place to have a beer was a pub called the Old Sailor right in the hub of it all.

I'll say it again Amsterdam is a beautiful city but eating out can get a bit out of control once and while...

Rome

Rome is an old city. It is older than the combined age of the original cast of "Threes Company." It was around when Napoleon was a bratty teenager and long before
"Hammer pants." The city is so old in fact that even the dust on the china located at the back of your grandmothers cabinet thinks its old. Get the idea yet?

There are monuments here that were built 28 centuries ago that still stand today in much the same form as they did when they were constructed. One for example is the Pantheon. This building was put together by the Romans to house the deities of the time; Apollo or Venus for example. Today it stands as a Catholic church, much like the rest of Rome, but it still has the worlds largest dome made of stone. I've seen this dome and it is farking huge!

The Pantheon:

Other major tourist draws were things like the Trevi Fountain. A huge fountain as far as fountain sizes are concerned. It depicts somebody doing something and there is a boat load of tourists constantly checking out the roaring waters. We even witnessed a marriage proposal! The legend at Trevi states that if you throw a coin into the fountain over your shoulder it will ensure a return trip to Rome and "when in Rome..."

Trevi Fountain:


We were joined by our good friend Stephanie for a couple of days and during that time we explored the cities more famous monuments like the Colosseum. This place was death. We took a tour of the old stadium and pretty much every story included the amount of people or animals that were killed during events. There have been stories of tens of thousands of people killed in a single day! It's bloody horrific if you think about it. Must have been a prosperous business as an undertaker in ancient Rome.

The Colosseum:







We also found out that the old stadium had running water and was covered in marble and was decorated from top to bottom, as was the Pantheon and other major monuments. The biggest question I had was were did all the precious stone go? The answer to that lies in our good friends at the Catholic Church. When Emperor Constantine finally embraced Christianity it open the flood gates on Rome. Over the next 16 centuries and to present day the church has run this town, even the mob stays away from them. Sometime during this rise to power they built the Vatican City.

This place is hands down the most opulent building on Earth. Every inch of this city state has some form of decoration, mostly in the form of marble. All of this precious stone was "acquired" from every other clad structure in Rome. I am not sure how I feel about the Catholic church but by no means did my did my impressions rise by seeing the likes of St. Peters Basilica and the Vatican museums. They are way over the top as far as expressing wealth and in my opinion it is far too much for " a church". Those views however can be hotly debated upon our return in a couple of weeks.

St. Peters Square:
St. Peters Basilica:

One of the highights of checking this area out was the Sistine Chapel. The Granddaddy of all holy places that nobody respects. The apparent rules are "no photos" and "be quite". Meanwhile back in reality about every minute a flash of a camera would filled the dimly lit room for a split second and the local security thugs would peer over the crowd looking for the culprit. Our very own Stephy Sanden was twice warned by the uniformed men about the use of her camera. I was hoping for her to get escorted out the Vatican back door, which everybody knows leads directly to Pope Benidicts chamber where the pontiff himself punches you in the gut and takes your milk money. That said Andy did manage to get a sweet shot of Michelangelo's "Creation." Click on the photo for enlarged catholic contraband goodness.

Sistine Chapel Ceiling:


Meanwhile back in the chapel about every 90 seconds the low whispers would slowly rise to dull talking at which point the paid "Shusher" would express his duty and Shushhh the crowd. We found this entertaining, so we made bets on when the next shhuss would be. We stayed for 5 shusses and then left.

Vatican Museum Opulence: