BC Trip – The Wedding, Capilano, and Phosphorescence

Sunday, the day of the wedding, we got up late and headed down to our private dock for a quick swim and some fun diving pictures. There was a black lab at the dock who was enjoying the water too. We’d throw a stick in the water for him and he’d jump in to get it. Then he’d have to swim all the way back to shore, jump back up on the far end of the dock, and bring the stick back to us. Once he dropped the stick relatively close to us, he’d start barking until one of us picked up the stick and threw it again. Poor guy – wouldn’t even jump from the high part of the dock. Ellie would have put him to shame!

After swimming, we headed into town to get something to eat before the wedding. We settled on Cocoa West Chocolatier where we got some gelato. With 25 minutes to go before the wedding, we figured we had better head back to the cottage to get changed so off we went. Luckily the island is small and our cottage was only about 10 minutes away.

We arrived at the wedding with a good 5 minutes to spare. As I walked into the church, I was handed a video camera and was told that I had to film the event. Huh?! Oh well, time to figure out how to work a video camera. My apologies to Boris and Kate for the (I can only assume since I didn’t see the final product) crappy job that I did. With a little advance notice and perhaps some practice, it may have turned out better.

The ceremony was nice. I particularily like the part where Boris and Kate exchanged food. Boris had picked out miso soup for Kate to eat, and Kate had picked out a meat stick for Boris to eat. Kate took a sip from the miso soup, and Boris took a bite from the meat stick. The idea was that in the future, as they eat these things (which are pretty much staples in their diet), they will remember the wedding, etc. I liked the idea!

After the ceremony there were pictures of course. The Ottawa crew got to dress up the reception area that we set up the day before. Table cloths, cutlery, napkins, flowers, etc. I made the mistake of noticing that a deer had crapped in the path between the hall (where the food would be) and the reception area outside. It seems nobody else had noticed it…yeah right! Anyways, after I had noticed it, I had no choice but to find some way to remove it. I searched around for a shovel, but all I could find was a short 2×4. My plan was to flick the crap into the woods with the 2×4. I had started to put this plan into motion when I was interrupted by a woman telling me to stop because I was going to get it all over the place. Well, since I was told to stop, I gladly did, and went to sit down to take a break. Well a couple of minutes later this same woman comes back and hands me a garbage bag. Let me tell you…I’ve picked up my fair share of crap in my time (thanks to owning a dog) and so I wasn’t really all that excited about having to pick up a load of deer crap. When she tried to hand me the garbage bags, I said, “Oh no, that’s ok, you go ahead.” To which she replied, “You’re not pawning this off on me!” I guess the expression on my face was one of disbelief since everyone who was watching me at this point thought I was going to lose it on the woman. The reasoning being that I was taking care of the deer crap situation and was told to stop by her. Anyways, a comprimise was reached whereby we took care of it together. I should also probably mention that I later found out that the woman was one of Boris’ sisters. :)

The reception was a lot of fun. There were a few funny speeches (Troy’s comes to mind) and naturally there was lots of drinking going on. The food was very tasty too. After many hours of partying with the newly weds, it was eventually time to go…but not before Jessie sang “Three Irishmen” for us while standing on top of a table in the hall. I really would like to get the words for that from her.

Since it was their wedding night and all, we grabbed the other occupants of their cottage and brought them with us back to our place so they could have a night alone. Worked out great for us, we got more people to party with back at our place. :) Naturally we introduced them to the wonders of our sauna.

The next day was clean up day at the hall and reception area. However, Matt, Alix, Steve, Jody, Dave and myself had already planned to go to Capilano Suspension Bridge so we unfortunately missed the opening of the gifts and the cleaning up. I wasn’t too upset about missing the cleaning up part, but it would have been nice to be around for the opening of the gifts.

The bridge was pretty cool. Steve and I got in trouble for running and jumping on the bridge. “No running and jumping on the bridge,” was heard from the loud speaker after we took advantage of a nice open stretch on the bridge with no people. And speaking of people…my God there were a lot there! It would be nice to be able to visit a place like that when there are no people around, but that’s never gonna happen so what can ya do? We even got a certificate after visiting all the required stops at the park (where we had to get a stamp to prove we had been there) but I’m not sure if I still have mine.

After our day at Capilano, we stopped at Denny’s to grab a bite to eat. We were starving (hence eating at Denny’s) but I think most of us felt even worse after the meal than we did before. They do have good milk shakes though.

Matt and Alix were kind enough to drop us off at Horseshoe Bay before heading back into Vancouver where they would be spending the next couple of days before going home. Dave, Steve and I hopped on a ferry back to Bowen, and Jody took the ferry to Nanaimo on her way to her parent’s place on Gabriola Island. The plan was for us to meet up with her the next day.

Once back on Bowen, we met up with Boris and Kate, after getting some more beer, and they drove us back to their cottage which was considerably farther from town than was ours. It was a really nice spot with a secluded cove. When we arrived there, Robbie and Troy were in the midst of a battle of sand castles. At first it looked like Troy was going to win, but in the end Robbie’s castle was the last one standing after Troy’s support log starting floating in the incoming tide.

We spent the night in and around the cottage, exploring the surrounding property a bit. Once it got dark we headed down to the beach to check out the phosphorescence that Boris had been telling us about. It was absolutely spectacular. Well with an opportunity like this, I wasn’t about to pass it up, so I stipped down and jumped into the water to experince this phenomenon first hand. WOW! It’s really something that you need to experience yourself to appreciate it. Watching from the shore is one thing, but actually swimming in it, is something else! I wont be forgetting that little adventure for a long time.

Soon enough it was time for bed. Steve had claimed the outdoor hammok, so I opted to sleep on the swinging bench on the porch. It wasn’t quite long enough for me, but I was tired enough that it didn’t really matter. It started raining early the next morning, like around 5 am I think. This naturally roused Steve from his slumber and he made his way inside. However, I had my head tucked inside my sleeping back (to keep the bugs from bothering me) and when I heard noises on the porch, I thought it was a deer! Did I mention that there are thousands of deer on Bowen?! Anyways, I was laying there thinking…I better be quiet, because I don’t want to scare the deer and have it freak out and kick me in the head or something. Eventually I got up the nerve to take a peek outside my sleeping bag and realized that it was just Steve moving his stuff inside.

Not long after that, everyone else started getting up and packing their stuff up. The plan was to catch the early ferry back to Horseshoe Bay. Miraculously, we got everything packed up (and into the van) with time to spare. Off to the ferry line we went and that would end the Bowen adventure part of the trip.

More to come…trip to Gabriola and Long Beech.