Sea Lion Caves

If you travel west from Victoria, just past lost creek is a trail that leads down to the water where some sea lions have taken up residence. This is unusual because they don't often set up home on shore as opposed to an off shore island. In the winter, hundreds of sea lions take up residence in Juan de Fuca strait. If you go to Race Rocks Light Station, you will see hundreds of them. They are fascinating, especially when you see them underwater. The trail to the caves is somewhat of a secret. The "Secrets of Victoria" has a detailed map to the cave. It is a flat trail until you cross the Juan de Fuca trail, then it drops rapidly towards the water. It is not an easy trail as can be seen by the picture shown here. It gives you breath taking views of the strait and you can get pretty close to the sea lions. People are encouraged not to get too close as it bothers the sea lions. That is why it is not advertised as a stop along the Juan de Fuca trail.

What is a Steam Donkey?

The steam monster shown here is actually calle a "Steam Donkey" because it used steam power to replace the donkey use to drag logs out of the woods. A "line horse" would carry the cable out to a log in the woods. The cable would be attached, and, on signal, the steam donkey's operator (engineer) would open the regulator, allowing the steam powered machine (donkey) to drag the log towards it. The log was taken to a mill or for shipment by rail, road or river. In some cases logs were loaded onto boats or floated directly in the water. Donkeys were moved by attaching a cable to a tree, a stump or something very secure and then the donkey would drag itself to a new location. Logging was a big part of the history of Ladysmith. To read more about ladysmwith, click here.

Fall Farm Forum and Community Festival

On a warm Fall day in October, what are you supposed to do? Well, why not go to Sooke and take in their Fall Farm Forum and Community Festival. We did and it was pretty darn amazing. There was enough information to sink a city slicker. There were tons of displays and some pretty neat things for kids to do. Our granddaughter was busy making apple juice (right) and she had a marvelous time putting together her own scarecrow, which she was very proud of. It now sits out front of her home in Fairfield where it is ready to greet fall visitors and halloweeners.
The display of mushrooms (left) was incredible. I had no idea that there were so many different mushrooms growing in our forests. I am not sure what is going on in Victoria right now, but the late fall weather has been exceptional for October. Yahoo!