Friday, February 19, 2010

Bay D'Espoir - Fortune Bay





We are starting to plan our spring/summer kayak trips and several members of KNL provided a great review of their paddling trip in the Fortune Bay area. Brian, Alison, Sue and Ralph described an extraordinary look at the past and present.
The map is from another trip but gives a bit of an insight into the coast.
A few entries back I described a Banff film festival entry entitled Finding Farley. This kayak trip had another Farley Mowat theme - and prompted me to purchase the book Bay of Spirits. I think the description by the group of The Goblins, Devil's Print helped create an interest in reviewing the history of the area. The old photo is of the community called: PushThrough thought to have received it's name based on the description of a whale passing through the narrows to the harbour. Likely it was one of the first sites established in the region. Apparently the Newman Company created a fishing station there in 1672. The first permanent settlement was in 1814.
Onc curious observation made by the presenting group was that despite a history of known settlements they found finding suitable camping sites extremely difficult.
A great destination for the summer.

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Australian boxing kangaroo - Vancouver 2010











Here is an interesting dilemma. Vancouver recently published a 137 page Protocol Manual that suggests to Vancouver residents how to behave and respond to visitors - among other things. Here is the link from the City of Vancouver website.

http://vancouver.ca/mediaroom/pdf/CoVProtocalManual.pdf

Yet, last week the city issued an order for Australian athletes to take down their banner that features the team mascot. Apparently it is still up but, the reaction from city officials hasn't made the olympic organizers any more popular with the residents and olympic supporters.

Somebody in city hall hasn't been catching the spirit of the games.

The focus should be on the athletes - organizers have to cut partipants a little slack. Afterall, a good part of what the olympics games is about is tolerance, friendship..

Oddly enough the public response to such overzealous flag monitoring, has been much more positive: the Australian boxing kangaroo flag is fast becoming a much sought after item.