Leaving the Island

Naked people are a breed of their own.

You have to give naked people credit. To walk around in the buff, in broad daylight, without a care in the world takes guts. From my experience, those who choose to go naked, aren’t always the people you would prefer to go naked. Old people in particular, seem incredibly comfortable with their bodies. I say good for them, for having the guts to do something I wish I could do, but wouldn’t. Heck, I’m too embarrassed to go around wearing a hat that says “Addicted to Jesus” even though it’s hilarious. Hilarious in two ways; first, because I’m a skeptical atheist (skeptical because I don't necessarily believe in god, but I'm skeptical of the fact that I don't know...) and second because it reiterates the point on the back of the hat by writing “addicted”.

So, back to my journey.

After the whole Strathcona incident, I spent some time with Carol-anne, Babysat Julian and decided to head out again. This time up to Port Renfrew.

To expect a nice, straight highway would have been foolhardy. I’m getting used to these coastal, mountain highways with their crazy turns, sudden drops and one lane bridges. This highway was no different, except in some spots, the highway has half disappeared due to landslides and instead of fixing it, they’ve simply made it into one lane… that’s cool, I guess…

Things I saw on the trip:
- Botanical Beach with it’s tidal pools, crazy twisty trees and apparent cougar sightings
- the sunset at China Beach
- Sooke potholes for a second time. I liked it so much I went back. With it’s crystal clear pools, high cliffs, waterfalls and rapids, who wouldn’t go back. Ben and I swam there all day, swimming from one pool to another. We would swim up the river and on the way back I’d hold onto his tail and he’d swim with the current and pull me along. We stayed for the whole day and were exhausted, but a pleasant kind of exhaustion.
- a naked old man at Sooke potholes who tried to talk to me, but I swam away… quickly. Not that I don’t admire his courage/perviness… It just kind of scares me.

From there, I spent a few last days with Carol-Anne.

Tubing down the Cowichan River has got to be one of my favourite memories from the trip so far (I mean, the naked guy was memorable… but I would have preferred a younger, less wrinkly naked guy…). We left the baby with Christian (thanks Christian) and drove to Cowichan, rented our tubes and sat on a slow moving river for three hours. In the middle of Vancouver Island’s heat wave, nothing could have been more refreshing than having your bum in the water as you sat back and relaxed.

Because it was so sunny and so hot, we bought a couple of hats from the dollar store. There were a few nice ones, but the ones we chose said “Addicted to Jesus”. We wore these for the rest of the day. At times I couldn’t figure out why I was getting funny looks, especially at the liquor store…then I remembered the hat. Since I was only wearing my bikini top (and shorts), I probably looked like a bible thumping hussy. Not that there’s anything wrong with that. It was after all a very hot day.

I had fun on Vancouver Island, but I miss the sound of loons echoing over an Ontario Lake, I miss white pines and smooth rocky shores, I miss cold sheets on a hot night, warm showers and flush toilets, but most of all I miss my friends and family. I travelled out west in search of something. A place, a time, an answer, but all roads led back to home. It’s been a long crazy journey and it’s not over yet, but I’m heading home, slowly.