Three of us just got back yesterday from kayaking around the Gulf Islands! Our rugged seafaring crew was myself, Mark Bakker, and Roy Bakker. It’s been about nine years since I last did it, which is far too long to be away from such beautiful scenery and great exercise! We saw some spectacular things – most notable of which was a rogue beam of yellow sunlight peaking through between some islands around sunset. It only lasted about 3 or 4 minutes, but was probably one of the most spectacular things I’ll see in my lifetime.

We woke up just after 4am and took an early ferry over to Duke Point, then pitched into the water over at Cedar By-The-Sea.  On the first day, we paddled about 15km: across to De Courcey Island, down to Pirates Cove, across to Ruxton Island, and then a little further to our campsite on a little island. Our map book marked a campsite on a small island as a wilderness site, but I climbed up onto the tree-covered rock and wandered around for quite a while and couldn’t find a spot. We asked some locals who pointed us down to another small island where people often camp.  This is where we witnessed the amazing lighting, seen in the photo above.

Day two, we clocked about 16km as we went down Valdes Island and briefly saw Blackberry point, then went north up through Gabriola Passage to Wakes Cove, and settled on the south east edge of Kendrick Island.  Right beside where the West Vancouver Yacht Club has property! From there, we had a beautiful view of the horizon, as it was clear blue sea to the south east, and we could even see Vancouver on the horizon to the east! We even manged to see a small fireworks display somewhere down in the Richmond/Ladner area (no, it wasn’t the Festival of Lights because it wasn’t the right night or the right area).

For our final day, we had to time our traverse through Gabriola Passage to be with the tide, and it was still fairly rough.  We paddled straight back across the channel back to Cedar By-The-Sea.  Packed up the boats and took the ferry back home!  In total, day three was about 10 km, which puts us at a total of 41km traveled by kayak.

Short 5 Minute Highlight Video

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This trip report was also posted on Club Tread.

Enjoy, and happy Canada Day!

Police pushed the crowd back forming lines with shields. Crowds kept coming pushing the lines and throwing things at them. More cars lit on fire.

As the night progressed, it become more and more violent and the Bay, London Drugs, and was broken into and looted. Clashes with police increased and arrests were made.

I recorded this on Saturday night while wandering the streets downtown! I headed straight for the busiest intersection.