Our Cross Canada trip has begun!   We are sleepy eyed and exhausted from the extensive “To Do” list that we navigated the last week before setting off on the 6:20 am boat from Langdale this morn.  Those of you who travel know the drill.  Yesterday alone was a frenzy of getting things done and between the two of us, this included:  watering the garden, mowing the lawn, mowing somebody else’s lawn, cleaning the fridge, cleaning the camper, packing the camper, finishing jazz stuff,  fixing the hoses, watering the palms, fertilizing the palms, grocery shopping, doing the last laundry, making beds, cleaning house, paying last bills, giving mom a watering routine orientation, trimming somebody else’s hedge,  trimming my bangs, and feeding the hummingbirds.   Now on the 9 am sailing to Swartz Bay sitting next to my travelling companion and husband Guy, engrossed in his National Geographic magazine about Mars, the list and sense of urgency about the list is fading from memory and an inkling of excitement is surfacing. 

Seems counterintuitive to be going to Victoria headed west instead of east because we keep telling people we are going east.  But Guy needs so badly to get the Pacific Ocean water from the West Side of Vancouver Island to take in his bottle across to Newfoundland.  He will fill half of the bottle here and then the other half of the bottle there (Dr Seuss inspired sentence).  While we are in Victoria, we will go to Mile Zero at Beacon Hill Park for the water, go to the Royal BC Museum, walk around James Bay and the Inner Harbor and possibly pay a visit to Emily Carr at her house. 

We are travelling in Guy’s trusted pickup truck recently cleaned last night inside with a power washer (me).  This is an inside joke for anyone who knows Guy and his truck.  Yes, the truck has been scrubbed and polished and at least for now we can breathe fresh air reasonably free of dirt and dust and as well avoid the risk of sitting on a handsaw and any other potential injuries from the tools of his trade.  Right now, it looks like a truck going camping.  Yippee!! 

On top of the truck is our relatively new popup camper.  It is stuffed with all the necessities of life including a badminton net, 2 bottles of red wine and cider, a portapottie, a crib board and cards, a jumbo Sudoku book, a small library of fiction and books about Canada, a stovetop expresso coffee maker, a mosquito tent (those mossies need protection from humans), a yoga mat,  150 tubes of acrylic paint and 23 – 14 x 18 blank canvasses.   Later I will fluff and tuck our temporary little home for our first two nights of many nights to come.  We are ready to face the world, or Canada anyway.  

Guy is in the popup right now working on his first painting.   He wanted to go pleine air today but was chased in by a few raindrops falling on his head.    He had a grand old time in Sidney today at a paint store and picked up the colors that inspired an arbutus tree painting. 

Until tomorrow.