‘Tread softly, Write with Impact’ What TAKEAWAYS we had at the British Columbia Association of Travel Writers (BCATW) annual symposium! Sixty keen travel writers gathered at the Century Plaza Hotel in Vancouver, BC on April 18, 2015. ~This event had it all~ Good flow~ good food~ good folks~Great info~ Takeaways aren’t just sports lexicon for […]
BCATW Symposium 2015 Grand Prizes ‘T’is grand!’ as the Irish would say of all things green. When I set out to acquire prizes (and grand ones at that!) for the British Columbia Association of Travel Writers (BCATW) Symposium 2015, I was excited. I’ve had a long-term ECO-love towards small-scale businesses that conserve and educate with […]
It’s Remembrance Day, 2014 and I’m interlocking the sleeves of my parents’ Air Force jackets laid out on the bed. They are arm in arm once more. Mum, a coding and deciphering officer with the RAF, and Dad, an RCAF air observer/navigator with the 10th Squadron, Bomber Command, met at a dance in Gander, Newfoundland […]
If A Tree Falls…? Forty-two Vancouver Skiers fled the Lower Mainland’s Sunday drizzle for a snowier destination to Manning Park on January 18, 2015. Jason, our International Stage Lines driver, assured us we’d be on the soft stuff by 10:15, and indeed we were. Jason stayed throughout the day, at Lightning Lakes, so most skiers timed their […]
A full International Stage Lines busload of Vancouver Skiers with Orville at the helm left Vancouver’s mild, foggy condition for the snowy interior on January 9, 2015. We arrived at Stake Lake, 25 kilometers south of Kamloops to enjoy over three hours of expertly-groomed and track set conditions. With an elevation between 1270 and 1410 […]
Bird-watching is the most popular recreation in America, and the Audubon Bird Count summons us every December to the Christmas Bird Count on the ‘Garden Isle’ of Kauai in the Hawaiian Archipelago. With David Kuhn, creator of the website, ‘Sounds Hawaiian’, we add native forest birds to our count. Kuhn leads us into the Alakai […]
Buccaneer Marina, on the northeast arm of Secret Cove, is a 45-kilometer drive from Langdale Ferry past Gibson’s Landing and Sechelt, on the sparkling Sunshine Coast of British Columbia. We’re headed for Buccaneer Bay on South Thormanby Island…a perfect place to horse around in sea kayaks on a fall Friday, if we can beat the weekend rush. Launch […]
We see neither wind nor wave from our perch on some rocks above the start of the 66th Across The Lake Swim, which loosely parallels the William R. Bennett Bridge (or Kelowna Floating Bridge), from the Old Ferry Wharf in West Kelowna to Hot Sands Beach, City Park, Kelowna in British Columbia’s arid interior. ‘Any wind? […]
Culture Days and the North Shore Writers’ Association Presents ‘Thanks A Lot Express-OH!’ Saturday, September 27, 2014 10-12noon At North Van City Library, 120 W. 14th St., North Vancouver Prompts, prompts and more prompts! The process of art is one of observing, absorbing, reflecting, reacting and presenting. Sometimes that requires a prompt—a gentle […]
The North Shore Writers’ Festival at North Van City Library The North Shore Writers’ Festival comes to town but once a year. In partnership with the North Shore Writers’ Association and the North Van City Library, I lasso it, wrestle with it, tie it down, embrace it, and kiss it on the nose. Lasso and Wrestle […]