Trip Through The Rain To Sunshine Coast

UNLIKE THIS cute little guy outside an ice-cream shop at the Langdale Ferry Terminal, I left my sunglasses at home.

I did not need them last rainy Tuesday when I drove along a busy wet highway and sailed the sea to eventually visit with family in Sechelt.

Clouds shrouded the treed hills surrounding Horseshoe Bay in West Vancouver when I parked my car and walked onto the BC Ferry that would take me to Langdale.

It was easy to forget as the vessel glided from the Horseshoe Bay shore that I was not heading to one of the Gulf Islands but to another part of the Mainland that is difficult to reach by road.

Although the area is known as the Sunshine Coast there were no rays anywhere except for a small brave glow from some guiding lights.

Reflections in widows mingled with the charcoal hued view. Light fixtures on the ferry caused rectangle shapes to hover like spacecrafts in the sky.

A woman on board told me that when she was a little girl (before ferries were equipped with radar) she and her mother would clang spoons on metal objects so that approaching vessels would know they were there.

I noticed an axe (one hopes to never need one) bearing the ship's name Queen Of Surrey. There are currently 35 vessels and a proud albeit controversial history to the BC Ferry fleet that you can read about HERE. They carve a fluid trail in the Howe Sound waters that quickly disappears but perhaps leaves a mark environmentally.

The fleet now run as a private company has linked family, friends and businesses along the rugged BC coast for decades. These vessels have transported millions of people over the years as well as increasingly larger vehicles … many of these carry goods to hard to reach places.

When the ship arrived at the Langdale harbor ...

I saw another vessel across the way that looked much like the one I was on.

Thanks to the showers flowers were brightly blooming.

It took almost two hours to drive to Horseshoe Bay from my home and another forty-five minutes to get from Horseshoe Bay to Langdale where I was warmly greeted by family waiting to take me on a forty-minute drive to Sechelt.

We shared hugs, good conversation and a delicious meal upon arrival at a restaurant with a nice view of the steadily falling rain.

Because I had things to attend to back home it was a short but distinctly sweet visit. A seagull stretching its wings expressed what I felt.

My drive to Horseshoe Bay to catch the ferry to Langdale put me off balance a little because of the heavy rush of traffic and ongoing road construction along the way. So I felt a sense of accomplishment ... as though I had stretched my own wings when I set off that morning away from my comfort zone.

And although my traveling there and back was relatively simple with no need for airplanes or a passport, I related a bit to what travel writer Paul Theroux once said, “You define a good flight by negatives: you didn’t get hijacked, you didn’t crash, you didn’t throw up, you weren’t late, you weren’t nauseated by the food. So you are grateful.”

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Copyright by Penelope Puddlisms