Canada

Hello from Down Under! My daughter and I are starting a grand adventure to explore the east coast of Australia.

I’ve written here before that borders fascinate me. Today I explored a tiny exclave of the United States that – for those of us without private planes or boats – is reachable only by driving through the adjacent parts of Canada.

I’m headed to Berlin this week for the 2024 European Identity Conference. I left a couple days early so I could go exploring a bit.

To ring in the New Year, I explored the coast from Tofino down to Ucluelet and back.

Long, long day on the road today, but the rewards were so worth it!

After a few long days on the road, I mostly took a rest today. I drove a relatively short route to Port Alice just to see what it was about and otherwise laid low and kept to myself today.

Today I drove as far as you can to the north of Vancouver Island. I’m staying tonight and tomorrow night in Port Hardy, a small tourist and fishing village at the end of British Columbia’s Highway 19.

Today I did a variation on the Pacific Marine Circle Route, which is to say that I explored the part of Vancouver Island that is mostly west of Victoria and Nanaimo.

I’ve been to Victoria, British Columbia, many times, but I haven’t seen much of Vancouver Island beyond the capitol city. Over the next several days, I’ll be “fixing” that – by exploring the rest of the island.

My daughter and I are on one last road trip before our summer vacation comes to an end. We both spent some time in the San Juan Islands over the last few days. (See 146 Parks for some details of my explorations.) Since then, we’ve headed north into parts of British Columbia neither of us have seen before.

We took a small family trip to Butchart Gardens in Victoria.