Spectacle Eyes on Halloween ...

All the better to see you through the woods and mists that hang low on this the last day of October …

 

… when the ghouls come out to play …

… or the creepy crawlies crackle through the undergrowth of fallen branches …

1897 First Edition cover

Will the lichen covered woods give up their secrets … will the orange glow of falling leaves, coloured trees, or the 1897 first edition of Dracula light our way …

The gravestone for the Stoker family
at St Peter's, Quamichan, Duncan

But this night of 1851 was born a novelist's younger brother:

… the moon will not be peering through the mists for Bram Stoker’s brother – Surgeon Lieutenant Colonel Richard Nugent Stoker (1851 – 1931) - he will rest surrounded by the rising moistness of the mellow gloomy night in St Peter’s on Vancouver Island …

… spectacles might be better to see your way  – here is Elton … labelled at the Raptor Centre (the photo is from Wiki - the eyes can be seen).

Spectacled Owl

These raptor eyes move silently waiting for an unsuspecting prey … so their nightly fill of warm flesh can be satisfied …

Have fun Halloweens – some of you are already into NaNo November month … enjoy one and all …

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories

We Are The World Blogfest # 19: Museum of Migration ...

A dedicated Museum of Migration can be found in South-East London … where various exhibitions are put on to give us an idea, an understanding of the hows and whys migration has occurred … and still occurs.

 

-        A museum of stories and experiences …

-        No turning back for so many:  

     … 1290 AD Edict of Expulsion a royal decree issued by Edward I expelling the Jews from England … overturned during Oliver Cromwell’s Protectorate in 1657AD.

… 1607AD English colonisers set sail from London for the New World.

… 2016 and on: the start of Brexit – even today the United Kingdom is wavering.

So much emotional heartache … while reminding us as to our abilities to overcome … to reach out … to learn more … and importantly remember to understand …

There are a number of articles on the website, while anyone in the UK can visit the Museum, events to visit and see video clips of their work …

From Wikipedia ... net migration rates - blue = positive;
orange = negative; green = stable; grey = none

… to see how we as individuals, as communities and as nations can come together to appreciate each other’s life … living peacefully with each other … the peace of many, will defeat disgruntled others …

We are all in this world … let us live in peaceful light … not cross into darkness … we can reach out across those barriers of intense hostility and aversion – let’s extend our hand of tranquil harmony …

We Are The World – In Darkness Be Light

Museum ofMigration website … No Turning Back exhibition

We can always be positive, interested and helpful ... let's always open our hearts ... 

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories

Cowichan Valley – settling in the 1800s … part 1

The Europeans had arrived in the late 1700s on the west coast of continental America, including Vancouver Island, while slowly bullying their colonial European way of life …

Cowichan Valley

 The First Nations had been in these waters and on these lands since the last Ice Age and possibly earlier … they knew the area with its local riches … calling it ‘Quw’utsun’ – meaning Warm Lands.

A Robert Bateman painting of
a canoe made by Bill Reid -
a Haida Canadian artist

A surveying coaster, the Hecate, landed in the tiny sheltered waters of Cowichan Bay and thus began the settlement in the Valley … mining, forestry, shipping, fishing and agriculture being those early occupations – a way for Europeans to exist.

Cowichan Bay

 The Hecate, originally a 4-gun paddle sloop, was launched in 1839 from Chatham Dockyard, Kent.  She had a brief 25 years or so history.  Her first assignment was the Syrian War in 1840; the Mediterranean came next, followed by serving in the West Africa Squadron.

The Hecate aground in 1861

In the 1860s, after conversion to undertaking surveys, she worked the seas off Australia before being assigned to the Pacific to the ‘island infested’ waters off British Columbia and the Haida Gwaii ...

Showing some of the islands
at the southern
end of Vancouver Island

In 1865 she was paid off and sold for breaking.



What should have been a fresh-faced lad of 18 years, was a crusty mariner named William Shearing who, in 1862, had arrived by way of India …

Haida Gwaii islands - Hecate Strait
was called the Queen Charlotte Sound

… he and a few others disembarked at Cowichan Bay – the only stop the Hecate made on the island on her way north … that stop set the wheels in motion for settlement in the Duncan/Cobble Hill area on Vancouver Island.

Victoria looking north 'up island' - today

At this stage Victoria, the capital of British Columbia, separated on the east side by an impenetrable massif, could only be reached from the Valley with an overland slog, or via a sloop …

When the route over the Malahat was tolerable -
probably in the 1960s/70s

More on the Malahat as we open the valley up ... and an ice up ... interesting times ... 

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories

Write ... Edit ... Publish ... Bloghop: Voodoo ...

The air was that clear mist seen across the Highlands of Scotland … heather haze it could be called, yet in other places it’d be the slate blue over the mountains interspersed with evergreen …

The Mustang Voodoo

She remembered those days in her youth with her grandfather … as she watched her son delight in his model, so carefully built … lollipop or matchstick, balsa wood pieces, sticky rubber and glue, some cardboard – they’d had to find, odd pieces of firewood ‘thorns’ …

… they had pored over the model’s plans … working out how each piece connected … he had been so careful meticulously laying out the pieces – making sure none were missing …

… in between as he worked, he made appropriate noises of a plane enjoying its carefree existence … then she’d hear the ‘neeeawe neeawe neeaweeee’ as he created a yaw … his sounds would ease off and the imagined plane would weave its way out of danger …

The model slowly grew becoming more like a plane everyday … little by little – he learnt the names of the various parts … then it was finished.

Now to the painting – he wanted purple with green wing tips to match the scenery I had described from grandpa’s tales …

We bought those little tiny pots of paint … and he once again settled into his world of the model … more noises came as he created the sounds of swoosh through the air, the gentle start-up of the engine as it taxied to its take off point, the revving of motors as he envisaged his little plane rising into the distant purple haze …

Voodoo purple light

Finally … he was finished … he basked in the delight of showing off his beautiful model … he still made noises, holding his stomach, as he envisioned a stall (eeeek), then the fall off towards the ground (poo-ouu, ssst, poo-ouu) … he proverbially pulled the stick back … his hands slowed the spin … while his wrists brought his Voodoo back to full flight again …

A beaming smile spread across my son’s face … he was so happy he’d been able to build great-grandpa’s Voodoo … he would now play for hours wistfully dreaming of grandpa and that era …

Voodoo at Reno Airraces 2014

… the clear hazy sky, with the purplish hue, out of which grandpa in his real life Voodoo would come rushing by before taking to the skies once again …

Oh how glad I was my father had written his own father’s stories down for us – we read these … while my son delights in absorbing the settings as well as the amazing twists and turns the ‘old’ Voodoo was able to do …

... your stories for your children so they can remember our earlier history ... 

Please read the other entries via the WEP page .... 

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories

Whale Trip out into the Salish Sea …

I took the opportunity of a clear, calm day to jump a trip to see some sea life out in the San Juan Islands and Straits to the east of Vancouver Island …

 

Leaving Cowichan Bay going south-east

… and while out thinking how difficult it must have been for those early navigators plying the seas to find a route through the intricate network of coastal waterways …

Showing Victoria, capital of Vancouver Island -
and then the border line interspersing the islands up
to 49th parallel south of Vancouver

… yet I also remembered that for centuries the indigenous peoples knew their lands, the flora and fauna all essential to their slower full way of life …

Looking east to the snow-covered Mount Baker

Just looking at that daunting land, full of mountain ridges interspersed with volcanic valleys, or the many ‘dead ended’ inlets … 

Java rock chain with Sealions, seals and plenty of birds

... then the multitude of islands and islets – some just called ‘chains’ (reefs) … ie rocky formations just at or below sea level – boggled my mind.

Enhanced iphone photo

We did see in the distance – but c’est la vie: it was lovely to be out and to have the opportunity – a Biggs Killer Whale pod, a harbour porpoise being eaten I believe … as it was being tossed around … Steller Sea Lions, seals numerous, lots of birds, including common murres …

Spieden Island

… on Spieden Island fallow deer from Europe, Moufflon sheep from Corsica, Sika deer from Asia (Japan) remain after it was set up for sport hunting … now it is unoccupied, but the animals thrive and remain … until (I guess) inbreeding occurs.

All on board - rarin' to go ... 

As an after-thought – you may know James Jannard who owns Spieden … he started and owned Red Digital Camera – forty of which were used to film The Hobbit.

We cruised down at 55 kmph (28 – 30 knots) … I sat hunkered down letting my eyes drift across the gentle calm waters … over to the USA mainland, or westwards towards our British Columbian coast …  

I had lots of layers on ... 

It was a lovely excursion run by Ocean Ecoventures, who are passionate and dedicated, responsible for ethical whale watching and wildlife viewing. 

Spieden Island is marked

They are a small owner operated tour company, members of the Whale Watch Association while supporting local researchers and conservation efforts. 

It was delightful … and I thoroughly enjoyed my afternoon out with them … so friendly – I did feel a bit like a teletubby – the only downside to the whole trip – but I was warm!

Ocean Ecoventures website and blog ... with some amazing photos

Here’s the Hobbit link to James Jannard and Red Digital …

Marine Mammal Research website 

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories

The Obedient Plant … found in Butchart Gardens ...

A second visit to Butchart Gardens highlighted ‘the Obedient Plant’ … having come across Miss Willmott’s Ghost at the Abkhazi Gardens in Victoria … the Obedient Plant became an obvious candidate for a post.

Obedient – the flowers stay in situ once bent back … as here ... 

For those Latin minded gardeners - it is Physostegia

Unobedient … if that’s a word?!  As the poor plant should be without man-handling!

So here are some views, some notes, some comments for a Thanksgiving post … Canadians celebrate on Monday … the history I will do in a follow up …

An early 1900s view of the limestone quarry (cement works) prior to its conversion into the Gardens we see today …

The Sunken Garden as I saw it … sadly it was a gloomy day ...

I’d gone back because I wanted to take the boat trip they offer from the tiny Tod Inlet – which is the secluded water leading up into the Gardens.

Tod inlet – small and sheltered … though the boats only run during early Spring to early Autumn (Fall I guess to you!) …

The trip gives a little history of the origins of the Gardens and goes around Brentwood Bay … I’d come over on the ferry – as a way of connecting the Cowichan Valley across to the Saanich Peninsula where Victoria’s airport is.

This captured pic gives an idea … I live just to the north of Mill Bay …

One of three ... 

I love the specimen trays they have out in the information centre – which is where I’d found Miss Willmott’s ghost.  

 

Specimen trays and …

Pears, Walnuts, Beechnuts and a Dogwood berry

Autumnal displays …

Here another find is the green Echinacea flower … interestingly the Greek ekhinos means hedgehog: live and learn!

There were hundreds of people there … and trying to find a few quiet moments is almost impossible – but good that the Gardens are thriving, I guess!

Seedbeds that earlier in the summer were grass … they are utilising their space effectively …

The various photos are briefly described …

My tomato and goat cheese tart was positively delicious – I went back for another before I left … couldn’t resist!  Apologies for the bite out!!

From a very wet Black Friday … the sun is due to reappear tomorrow … I hope you all have lovely weekends and for Canadians enjoy your Thanksgiving day …

This is an iphone photo… I think it is the Eunonymus Europaeus …

This iphone photo doesn't do it justice - the colours are
lovely ... while the Blue Poppy itself is gorgeous

You can buy one of these delightful shopping bags … advertising their special Tibetan Blue Poppy … another story – another day!

Hilary Melton-Butcher

Positive Letters Inspirational Stories