Weather: Beautiful, a nice breeze as I cycled today with beautiful sun shinning.
I was due to meet Rosy for breakfast at 9:00am, and so I was down for 8:50am and Rosy was late ... AGAIN! However only 5 minutes late and so I let her off. After breakfast we went to the bike hire shop and I got myself some wheels.
Rosy had told me that the potholes we were planning to visit were only 30km's away and that the water would be lovely to swim in if it was a hot day ... and so we set off.
Unlike Tofino the whole way was a designated cycle path (and also the bike was allot nicer to ride ... no saddle soreness for me) that, at the start, went through urban areas and parallel to busy main roads (not very scenic). However after about 18km we got away from human development and entered a rural and 'Jurassic park' type of terrain area with ferns on the ground, huge trees and rock faces dominating our views. The strange thing about Canada's weather is that, when you are in the sun you are pretty hot but as soon as you go into shade you become really cold (much colder than normal) ... it's like the Canadian ground doesn't hold any heat and you could really tell the difference on this bike ride.
We continued to cycle on and on (and on) and it was all lovely and picturesque with wooden bridges (that when cycling across shattered all your bones in your body due to the vibrations) over deep canyons, however I did notice the 'km' signs going up and up along the path. When looking at the map it appeared that the distance we covered didn't justify the distance covered on the map and so I questioned Rosy about it, to which her reply was "... I was told it was only 35km..." (35km ... gone up by 5km since yesterday).
This wouldn't be the first time I questioned Rosy over the distance and every time it changed to "... well I think it should be between 30km and 40km..." until it actually turned out to be 50km to the potholes!
Once we were there we had some lunch (we were both starving and ate loads) before trying to get down to a pothole ... which we were unsuccessful as the Canadian authorities had closed most of them off. Instead we went to 'pebble beach' which was exactly like it said on the tin, and went swimming in the lake.
The freshwater lake was biblically cold and my feet went numb, swiftly followed by my legs (so much for the water being nice on a warm day - hey Rosy). However Rosy said that after a while your body gets used to it and that you just have to enter the water in stages (i.e. put you legs in, get used to the temperature, put your waist in and get used to the temperature etc, etc). Anyway to cut a long story short I did go swimming in the lake but it did take a little while.
Swimming in the lake was fantastic and there were a few others doing the same; some children were snorkeling and it was a little worrying when one child shouted to the other "... look here, I've found the biggest one I've ever seen..."
BIGGEST ONE WHAT! ...water snake, crocodile, cod ... what!
After about half an hour we got out of the water and then we sunbathed until the sun went behind the tress and, just like when we were cycling, the temperature plummeted and so we got changed and back on our bikes.
It had take us 4 hours to get to the 'potholes' and it was now 6:00pm. Neither of us fancied cycling back and so we cycled into the nearest town and caught the bus back to Victoria (all local buses over here have bike racks on the front, which are so simple but yet so brilliant ... need to introduce them into the UK).
Once back we were starving; I had a 'chunky' canned meal left over, however we both fancied going out for something a little more substantial ... pizza was decided. However looking at the restaurant pizza prices we both purchased a oven cook pizza from the local supermarket (I forgot about my 'chunks meal')...
... Okay so the hostel kitchen doesn't have an oven. We both broke down laughing, as we were both so hungry, and I think we would have cried if not. Anyway, where there is a will there is a way, and so we decided to create our own ovens by using a frying pan on the stove, putting abit of oil in the pan and then covering the frying pan over with a bowl.
The plan would have worked perfectly if 'tool' here hadn't got impatient, 'blasted' his pizza (turned it up onto the 'high' setting) and then forget about it only to return to a steaming pizza, which the toppings looked good, but the bottom of the pizza was charcoal. I ate what I could and then chucked the rest in the bin.
Tomorrow I head back to Vancouver for my last night in Canada (where has the time gone from the 6th May until now?) whereas Rosy is heading north up Vancouver island. We said our goodbyes tonight just encase we miss each other tomorrow; I will miss Rosy allot as she kind of pushes me out of my comfort zone ... I don't think I would have ever decided to go swimming in a fresh water lake without a little encouragement (and it was sooo good ... if a little cold).
It's late and so I should really go to bed ... hadn't had allot of sleep recently and tomorrow will be another early start!
Toodle Pip!
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