Days 31 and 32 - winding down

Friday 15th Day 31

We had heard of a must visit store, so feeling in need of a slight change we headed over to CAPITAL IRON

It's on Store Street, rather appropriate name for a street that would have had shops for supplying ships arriving in the harbour, at a facility that onced dismantled old boats. Now it is full of hardware, housewares, marine and camping supplies and a large BBQ, garden furniture and garden supplies department.

The basement is a treat of old stuff. No other word for it. Bits and pieces from the original shop as well as the odd antique.


Paul loved it. I did a bit of shopping in tourist central and finally found my tacky souvenir.

Paul's cousin and his wife had invited us for dinner so after a quick shower, it's been hot here and a touch humid, we drove over and spent the evening.



Saturday 16th Day 32

This is Dragon Boat Festival weekend so this morning after breakfast we headed down to the inner harbour .

Farmer Vicki and Daisy the Cow were wandering around entertaining the children and stopping for photo ops. I now have a picture of me with the best kind of cow. Non-farmyard.




On the main stage there was , along with other demonstrations and music, a selection of several Cantonese Opera productions. The costumes and makeup were remarkable and we stayed as long as we could in the hot sun and uncomfortable chairs.




And of course we watched several heats of the Dragon Boat races. There are teams here from all over BC, from Alberta, Oregon, Washington State and even one from California.

We had to get a shot of this team, Anchors Dragon, the navy entry and we cheered them on for Emily.


The races are held in the inner harbour with 5 boats per race. Finals tomorrow. The general water traffic continues on as you can see with this whale watching boat passing by.

We've had fairly consistent warm weather 24-28C since the Aug. 1st holiday weekend and prior to that is was pleasantly mild. The odd rainy day hasn't slowed us down so it seems our timing was good for our holiday.

We've slowed our pace and are feeling less inclined to hunt out places to visit. The weather is forecasting rain so we will gauge our last few day's activities accordingly.