Migrants, Memorials, Metropolitan Meanderings

The Victoria old-timers took off in a jet airplane and spent a fortnight in southern Ontario, half the time in Toronto. This country mouse was entirely willing to believe the report I received that Toronto is now North America's fourth-largest city. Navigating a late-afternoon route out of Pearson airport, westward along the 401 is a nightmare Jan and I have previously experienced but the trial never seems to get easier. I have no idea how people manage to do it twice daily while retaining some facsimile of sanity.

On arrival day we made a beeline for more tranquil territory. Sort of. Point Pelee is a jewel in Canada's national park system not because of soaring mountains, vast prairie vistas, or raging unspoilt rivers, but because of its life-and-death significance to migrating birds. Every year around this time warblers, sparrows and flycatchers fly northward across Lake Erie and land exhausted on the closest bit of land that meets their eye – Point Pelee.  They arrive in their hundreds or thousands daily, tired out and easy to see. Where hordes of birds congregate, something else does too: hordes of people carrying binoculars, spotting scopes, long-lens cameras, or all of the above. Happily, in contrast to the 401, they are not hurtling along at 110 kph.

We spent two full days and bits of two more in the bird mecca. Prepared for warm May-type weather, we regretted not having brought goose-down parkas. The thermometer dipped close to zero, winds howled. Ten years ago on our first Pelee pilgrimage we found about 140 species over the same time period. We fell 45 short  this time but grumbled only a little: there was still plenty to divert two Victoria-based birders who have no chance of seeing eighteen different warblers in their own bailiwick.

En route to Pelee we indulged another trip priority, dipsy-doodling our way into this village or that town we'd never seek out if not for the fact it has a war memorial I particularly want to see. It is one of my many pieces of good fortune that Janice indulges this odd madness, even manages to be mildly entertained by the diversions that inevitably arise as the quest is pursued.

The lure of memorials in a half-dozen towns at the east end of the Niagara Peninsula drew us in that direction. We paused en route to see the Canadian Warplane Museum at Hamilton and actually got to see – and hear – a WWII Lancaster bomber in flight. We ventured into Niagara Falls and joined yet more throngs of people gawking at nature's offerings. We ate fish 'n chips at the bar of a Fort Erie pub and watched the Toronto Maple Leafs collapse in the third period of Game Seven against Boston.

After driving 1,500 km we returned the car in Toronto and happily got about for a week on shank's mare or subway. I was euphoric. We watched ball games at Christie Pits and the place we used to call the Skydome. We welcomed Steve and Elizabeth from Winnipeg, rode a quadricycle on the Toronto Islands, prowled the Kensington Market and the St. Lawrence one too. Steve and I visited the Hockey Hall of Fame and queued up to photograph each other standing alongside the Stanley Cup. We saw lots of nephew Michael, swilled beer and ate hotdogs and Cheetos with Mike's family and his friendly neighbours.

But it wasn't just baseball and hotdogs. Oh no. We endured screaming kids at the MacMichael Gallery in Kleinburg, taxed old knees at the Royal Ontario Museum and even joined the blue-bloods at the opera. Jan was over the moon about the Canada Opera Company's production of Lucia di Lammermoor.

Once inside the 401/427 Toronto is a surprisingly easy place to find relaxation. There is abundant architecture, public art and historic places to contemplate. And abundant diversions too. The town that many Canadians pretend to hate is just fine in my books – just as long as you stay away from the 401.  

Saturna Rhapsody

Pal Judith counts it her favourite place on earth; I feel no impulse to challenge her choice. Yesterday we three – Judith, Jan, and yours-truly – made our annual pilgrimage to her favourite place – Saturna Island's Brown Ridge-Taylor Point area and somehow managed to exceed the great expectations we trundled to the trailhead at Saturna's highest point, Mt. Warburton Pike.

Though it has plenty of competition the Brown Ridge-Taylor Point route is quite simply the most glorious day hike in the entire south Vancouver-southern Gulf Islands region. Starting at an elevation just under 500 metres, we hiked down to sea level at Taylor Point, savouring familiar but no less astounding 180-degree vistas over a feast of magnificent islands south of Saturna: little ones like Blunden, Skipjack and Flattop, mid-sized ones such as Stuart and Waldron, big ones too – Pender, Orcas, Saltspring. Spectacular though it is, the hike is remarkable for the absence of fellow travelers we typically see.

Feral goats frequent the bluffs, black-tailed deer too, and – at this time of year – plenty of woodland birds. Every April we keep a lookout for two migrant species: Townsend's solitaire and mountain bluebird. Yesterday, for the first time ever, we saw both. As for fellow humans, the day was happily, blissfully typical: we had the ridge entirely to ourselves.

In April wildflowers proliferate in these parts: shootingstars, calypso orchids, blue-eyed mary, coralroot, fawn lilies et al. At Taylor Point white-crowned sparrows marked their territory in proprietary song, harbour seals eyed us warily from the littoral, bald eagles patrolled the headland, a garter snake sunned itself at trailside.

We explored new territory, the first few hundred metres of the shoreline trail from Taylor Point to Saturna Vineyards, liked it hugely, and vowed to devour more of it next time.

The long day provided a smorgasbord of nature's finest. We capped the day with a cookout at Winter Cove marine park: smokie-style hotdogs washed down with Blue Buck beer. We relished a fine sunset and savoured the gathering dusk. Sea lions cavorted noisily in the rapids between Saturna and nearby Samuel Island. Under a near-full moon a frog symphony erupted from the Winter Cove marsh. Bats hawked for flying insects. We walked the short distance to Boat Passage and – from a safe distance – appreciated the bright lights of Vancouver, from the Tsawwassen coal terminal to the Grouse Mountain ski hill.

Yes, it was a day to cherish. But, always one to beware sentimental excess, Jan pointed out that the day wasn't quite perfect: after all, not once during our long Saturna day did we see a pod of orcas flying by.

We’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet

Her friends will rejoice to hear that the fractured shoulder is perfectly healed and arm mobility sufficiently restored that hill-climbing is once again a feature of Jan's life. How glad we are. With Winnipeg Steve keen to get some Vancouver Island mud on his hiking boots we three joined Mary and Mike for an impromptu ramble in the Gowlland Range, to Jocelyn Hill.

Birds were a target, specifically one bird, the pine grosbeak, usually rare in these parts, but spotted the day before. Denied a sighting before reaching the Jocelyn summit, we at last saw one, then another, then a gang of five, finally maybe a dozen in all. The hill's abundance of arbutus berries was the obvious draw, not just for the grosbeaks, but for platoons of cedar waxwings and a whole division of robins.

Friends are important enough that wordsmiths write poems about them, and novels and plays, even a well known sitcom or two. I find life seldom sweeter than when spent hanging out with pals, whether sharing lightheartedness and licorice allsorts on a nearby hill, or communing with a wee dram on the cabin porch at Big Bras d'Or.

We passed Christmas in Coquitlam with Lexi and Ben, Doug and Allison, Steven too. Stockings were well stuffed and turkey plentiful but what I liked best was exactly what I anticipated: heading outdoors to turn over rotting logs with young Lexi. No, we didn't find a salamander -- except the plastic one the four-year-old planted when I wasn't looking -- but the little naturalist was happy with the next best thing: a clutch of eggs including one nearly as blue as sapphire.

After Christmas the Coquitlamites returned the visit. We took Lexi to see the woolly mammoth at the BC Museum and all the creatures of the natural history section. Asked why the birds didn't fly, we explained they once did, but are now lifeless and stuffed. Lexi seemed unfazed. In the evening I played Hearts with Jan's sons and marveled at the show of brotherly love exhibited by Doug when Steve didn't play as his younger sibling felt he ought to. The thought occurred that I might resolve to be more carefree about mere games.

Given that this is the last day of dear old 2012 my mind turns to other potential resolutions. Donald Trump might resolve to exercise his brain at least as frequently as he does his mouth. Stephen Harper might decide to rule as though he enjoyed the support of only four voters in ten. Kim Jong-il could vow to recall that what goes up must necessarily come down. As for me, I find as old age deepens that my pledges grow rather less ambitious: remember my prunes . . . turn off the stove . . . look both ways before crossing the street.

Whatever you resolve, gentle reader, may it leave you content rather than cranky, healthy instead of haggard, vitalized rather than vexed.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and never brought to mind? Should auld acquaintance be forgot, and auld lang syne? For auld lang syne, my jo, for auld lang syne, we’ll tak a cup o’ kindness yet, for auld lang syne.