Bike!

Mp3 track of the day - Bicycle race - Queen

Weather: Warm with a gentle breeze ... foggy in the morning but it cleared in the late afternoon.

Going back to yesterday evening me, and a nice Swiss guy, went back to the beach I visited earlier that day to take some 'sunset' shots. It was lovely and you can see the outcome on my flickr account (see the link on the right hand side of this blog).

This morning I had lovely lie in and lazily got ready for the day. Ready at around 11:30 I left the hostel armed only with a bottle of water, lunch (4 cheese sandwiches and 2 oranges), a coat, suncream and my sunglasses. I was going to embark on a first this trip, yes I was going to hire a bicycle.

I don't usually like travelling on anything other than my feet (not into bikes, roller blades, skateboards etc) and so this took allot of self convincing. Yesterday I had checked out part of the route I would be taking today and it had a cycle path away from the road ... so that was good. It cost me $20.00 (£14.00) for 24hrs hire of a bike, a helmet and a bike lock. I put on my helmet, saddled up and road off into the sunset (well down the path). Now I know that when I wear a bicycle helmet I look like a chimp, and so I kept my head down ... actually today was another first of my trip; I had decided to wear my sandals ... however the Britishness is strong in me and so I wore black socks with the sandals ... oh yeah, I am the height of fashion.

My original plan was to take the cycling easy; I hadn't been on a bike for a while and the last thing I wanted to do was injure myself now. What's more the gears on the bike were the wrong way around; the bottom gear leaver was to change down the gears, whereas the top gear leaver was to change up ... became a bit of a problem when facing hills. However as soon as I got on the cycle track I was like Lewis Hamilton on two wheels; I peddled quicker and quicker taking the corners at the best possible position to maximise my speed and exit ... it was brilliant ... until the bike track stopped.

Yes indeedly, I couldn't understand it. The bike track stopped about 6km (or 3.6 miles in a proper measurement for distance) from the beach; this kind of reminded me of normal public sector projects ... the intention is there but they are never quite right, either due to incorrect budget controls or a change of power therefore changing their mind on what they want doing.

Anyway this meant I had to travel on the road and this I did ...

... I then very quickly changed onto the right-hand side of the road after forgetting which side the Canadians drove on.

After about 40 minutes I arrived at my first destination, Schooner Cove. Getting to the beach was more interesting than the actual beach itself with a 1km (or 0.6 of a mile) board walk through, what seemed to be a tropical rain forest. This time the board walk seemed way too long to get to the beach and it felt like the local council had too much money for this project and so, instead of saving the money, made the board walk a little longer.

I didn't spend too long on the beach as it was cold and very foggy, and so I headed back through the jungle and onto my bike towards Long Beach. On mounting my bike I felt really saddle soar and so I hurried my trip to Long Beach. Once there I eat lunch and went for a walk along the beach. Whilst walking I did notice some pathetic attempts at building sandcastles and I wished I had my bucket and spade with me (I'm such a child) as I'll show them what a sandcastle should look like.

The fog was so dense that you could only see 300 yards in front of you and so it actually felt like you were the only one on the beach as you couldn't see anyone else. It took me an hour to get from one end of the beach to the other, and on my return, the fog lifted to give me a beautiful sunny late afternoon (it also allowed me to search for any beach babes out there). I have to say that I actually think the beaches around Tofino, that I visited yesterday, were more beautiful but I was glad to have visited.

It was around 4:30pm and I decided, with a 1hr 30min cycle ride to get back to Tofino, I would head back. I had cycled 16km (9.6 miles) to get here and so, overall I would have cycled nearly 20 miles ... not bad for a newbie. I wasn't looking forward to getting back on the bike; I was really saddle soar and I had run out of water.

Instead of stopping off for a drink I decided to wait until I got back to the hostel as I had a 2ltr bottle of Pepsi waiting for me. As a motivator I decided that I would purchase myself a chocolate bar to go with the Pepsi and I was deciding which one (Dairy Milk ... Lint white chocolate and coconut ... oh how about Lint milk chocolate with strawberry, yum) which made me pedal faster. Once again I was Lewis Hamilton leading the 'tour de France' (because those cyclists were still in France whereas I was in Canada ... light weights) and I was hitting all of my apexes.

About two-thirds of the way back I noticed that I was closing in on this cyclist and, in true Jeremy Clarkeson fashion, I decided that 'I'll have her' and so I closed in on her and over-took her on the inside around a small bend ... perfect Hamilton over take. Now nothing could stop me and I over took people (okay, to be truthful the rest were all walking) left, right and centre.

I arrived back at Tofino around 6pm and I gave my bike back; I had enjoyed the day but I was glad to have given the bike back (I was now walking like John Wayne) and then I headed to the Co-op (the locale supermarket). I purchased a bar of Dairy Milk (as they didn't have an lint) and headed back to the hostel to sit in the window seats with my chocolate and Pepsi ... bliss.

Once back I first had to nip upstairs, which was a real mission, and then came back downstairs and ate my Dairy Milk 100g bar in record time (so fast it amazed me ... looks like I needed the calories).

Tomorrow I head to Ucluelet at 7:30am ... I need to get up early but the problem is that I'm sleeping in 'the games room' tonight. As this hostel is soo popular they put some mattresses in the games room for people to stay (remember I got a cancellation for tonight) but the games room won't close until 11:30pm ... going to be a long day tomorrow, but hopefully I'll see the broken Islands in Ucluelet.

Toodle Pip!

The Hostel Kitchen

I know that I have done my blog for today (and so I should be out enjoying myself). However, before I do so, I want to tell you about a phenomenon that isn't rarely talked about within the world of travelling ... the hostel kitchen...

Lying dormant for 22 hours of the day (apart from hippy travellers coming in occasionally to scavenge a stick of celery) the hostel kitchen erupts between the hours of 7:00pm and 9:00pm. 30 hostel guest decent telepathically at the same time to cook their evening meal.

Firstly you have to find 'your space' to prepare your meal. This involves allot of pushing, and the use of elbows, to get the prime spots (and there are prime spots within a kitchen ... don't prepare your food above the 'knives and forks' draw or else you will be asked to move more times than you can count). Once within 'your space' you then make yourself as big as possible whilst looking left and right every 0.001 seconds to make sure no one else is even thinking of entering.

Once you have 'your space' the next battle is to get as many (note not the ones you need ... as many) utensils as possible. You have a cheese grater in your right hand ... you know you won't need it but if you let it go you will never see it again. There is also an added complication with grabbing utensils in that, if your not careful, you will lose 'your space'.

Now the next thing is to tackle the 'hostel fridge' to get your food. A fridge big enough for a family of four holds 30 hostel guests food. It takes a degree in physics to open the door without everything toppling out on top of you and yet, whilst getting your food, you also have to watch out for 'utensil scavengers' lurking in the dark depths of the kitchen, ready to steal your prized cheese grater.

So you feel like you've done a days work in the space of 20 minutes but you still haven't even prepared your food. Within the hostel kitchen their are three cooks; firstly you have the 'wanna be professionals' who purchase their meat from the deli, fish from the fish market and vegetables that I've never even seen before. They slice and they dice with one eye constantly fixed on what the competition are cooking. I don't understand this cook ... 4 hours later and their meal looks less appetizing than my 4 minute microwavable meal.

Next you have the 'no hopers'; they would like to be a 'wanna be professional' but they haven't got a clue. They purchase ingredients for their tea but usually miss half of what they need. The first thing they pick up in the kitchen is a frying pan, which is a symbol of 'hostel kitchen dominance', and they have seen it being used on tv, they know deep down they have to use it but they have no idea how to.

Finally you have the last group of 'hostel cooks' called the 'I can't be bothered' cook and once they catch sight of the pandemonium within the kitchen they either go out to eat or purchase a microwavable meal so that they can get in and out of the kitchen quickly.

Now we are onto cooking the food and even this gives further problems. There are eight hobs and two ovens for 30 meals ... have you ever seen 4 pots balanced on each hob (each getting exactly 25% of the heat) and 15 pizzas stacked one on top of the other in the oven ... you have if you've been into a hostel kitchen. By now the humidity within the kitchen has passed that of the Amazon rain forest as 10% of the worlds pasta resources boil away.

Finally, heroically, all the meals are prepared and then it dawns on each hostel guest simultaneously ... there are only 22 seats within the dining area!

The Beach

MP3 track of the day - Pure Shores - All Saints

Weather: A beautiful hot day with a cool breeze ... perfect beach weather.

I didn't sleep that well last night ... not sure why (maybe due to the huge amount of sleep I got in Port Hardy) and so I was ready to leave for the day at 8:15am. However, beforehand, I needed to check if there were any cancellations for the hostel I am in ... and there were, huzzah! So I booked in for an additional night (Wednesday night). I also needed to phone up the 'C&N Backpackers' hostel in Ucluelet as I am planning to spend Thursday night there, however no one answered the phone (I left an answer phone message and asked them to email me).

Once out of the hostel I headed straight to the nearest beach, which the owner of the hostel had recommended. The beach was superb and, to make it even better, there were only about five other people there ... brilliant. I spent about an hour and a half there photographing whilst walking up and down the beach a couple of times ... the views were stunning and, apart from it being a little chilly, it was heaven.

I then left the beach and headed into town; just like in Port Hardy and Prince Rupert the town wasn't that big and so it didn't take me to long to look around. As I was now staying another night (2 full days in total) it now made it worth doing a grocery shop (I never do a grocery shop for one day as I wouldn't be able to eat the stuff in a day, and I would struggle to carry it to another hostel). I purchased:

1x pack of cheese slices

1x pack of 6 cinnamon cakes

3x oranges

1x frozen Ravioli meal

1x loaf of white bread

1x tinned Irish Stew

1/4 x Watermelon

1x 2ltr bottle of Pepsi

All for $30.00 (£21.00) and that should do me for my time here; the Ravioli and Irish Stew (with a cinnamon cake for dessert) for tea, cheese sandwiches, watermelon and a cinnamon cake for the lunches and some breakfast bars I already had, the oranges and the cinnamon cakes for breakfast ... sorted.

It was nearly lunch time and so I headed back to the hostel for a cheese sandwich, the biggest slice of watermelon you can think of and a cinnamon cake (with bottled water to wash it down). It was probably the healthiest lunch I've had for ages and I was so glad to be eating fresh fruit again (in North America it's very difficult to eat healthily and so I have been eating burgers, crisps etc for ages and I'm sick of them).

After lunch I checked my emails to see if the 'C&N Backpackers' in Ucluelet had got back to me ... they hadn't and so I phoned them and booked Thursday night over the phone. I also worked out my average spend which has gone up AGAIN, but only by £1 to £63.02 ... I was a little surprised by this considering how much travelling I had done in the previous week but I wasn't complaining. The problem is that I'm now running out of time to get my average back down to £50.00 per day, and so I'll try to aim for £60.00 a day.

Being at a little of a loss for what to do this afternoon I enquired with the owner off the hostel whether I could walk to Long Beach. He said no, however he also said the best thing would be to hire a bike ... probably tomorrow so I could get the full benefit of the 24hrs rental. I'm not sure about hiring a bike ... I don't really like bikes, I much prefer to walk, and so I decided to have a think about hiring a bike over this evening. Still this left me the problem with what to do this afternoon; after looking at my map and guidebook I decided to head to another beach (MacKenzie Beach) which was about 40 mins out of town. The beach was just as lovely as the first, however as 3 or 4 resorts backed onto it, the beach was a little busier and so I walked up and down it once before returning to the hostel.

I'm back at the hostel early tonight ... I had planned to do this as I want to go to the beach I went to this morning to get some sun set photos ... hopefully the tide won't be fully in tonight.

Tomorrow I think I might hire a bike ... not sure what else to do.

Toodle Pip!

Tofino

MP3 Track of the day - May it be - Enya

Weather: Sunny, bright and beautiful

I caught the Greyhound at 9:30m and left Port Hardy for a 12 hour trip to Tofino. Whilst waiting for the bus I met a Japanese guy who I had seen on the ferry to Port Hardy and a lady who was going to Tofino. We chatted a little and we almost missed the coach through talking.

The first leg of the coach journey was to a place called Parksville where I was scheduled to wait around 2 hours before changing to the Tofino coach. The first leg of the trip was okay; there were occasional good views but these were few and far between due to the tree line hugging the road. At the first stop an old guy got on the bus and, surprise surprise, he decided to recline his seat into my knees (if I have a coach company I am going to specifically ask for no reclining seats!) and kept doing so periodically throughout the trip, not working out that the reason the chair won't go any further is because my legs were in the way.

We stopped for lunch and the Japanese guy (Ryota) and I went for something to eat. Previously I had told him that I will be going to Japan later this year and he was quizzing me where I was planning to go (he lives to the north of the main island and he has said, if I go up there, then I can stay at his house) and how much Japanese I knew. I said that I wasn't sure where I was going and that I will need to look at my guidebook when I get home; I also said that I knew a few words of Japanese but, as they were karate words, I didn't think they would help me much in modern day Japan society ... I started to reel off 'front kick', 'back kick' 'front punch' in Japanese which made him laugh.

Soon after I arrived at Parksville and I was concentrating so much on getting off the bus I forgot to say goodbye to Ryota (will have to email him and apologise). I was glad to get off the bus; two stops previously some woman got on with the worlds worst sneeze ... not to sound to disgusting, but it sounded like she was pouring germs into the coach at an alarming rate! I had a two hour wait for the next coach and so I got a drink and some fries; the lady I spoke to at Port Hardy bus station was also waiting and so we chatted to pass the time. Her name is Barb and she is biologist focusing in the conservation of amphibians (umm ... don't hear that everyday). Our conversation therefore mainly revolved around the conservation of wildlife, her using her life knowledge of conservation and I using the 14 episodes of 'Planet Earth' I had watched before coming to Canada.

Soon enough the second Coach came to take us to Tofino and off we went. This journey was allot more picturesque and we had scenes of mountains, lakes, forests ... it was beautiful. The journey however wasn't quite as beautiful; when I first got on the coach the bin next to me had a nappy in it (who leaves a dirty nappy on a bus?) and so I moved seats; then the journey became abit of a roller-coaster with us going up and down and side-to-side ... a few people looked a little green and I wasn't feeling 'tip-top' myself. Still the view was beautiful and it was worth it.

I arrived at Tofino at 9:30pm and went to find my hostel, which is located right on the coast. It is simply stunning here and I am so looking forward to tomorrow to walk along some beaches and take some photos (weather should be good tomorrow ... fingers crossed). The only problem at the moment is accommodation ... I only have only two nights here because it's fully booked (this hostel is very popular and it's easy to see why) and so I keep checking for cancellations. The other possibility is a place called Ucluelet but I'm having trouble getting through; I will have to try again tomorrow and see if I can get a cancellation here or find another hostel to book into near here.

I'll keep you posted

Toodle Pip!