Aylmer Express "MoHo" Extravaganza 2006

No fooling around today. As opposed to pretty much every other day so far, we got up early … 6:00 am early! We wanted to get a jump-start on the day for two reasons. One, we were attempting to avoid as much traffic as possible on the road from Ucluelet to Nanaimo. And two, we wanted to catch a ferry that got us into Vancouver early enough to miss the rush hour … assuming that is even possible in Vancouver. I am proud to say that we were successful on both counts. As I eluded to in a past post, we did NOT have the Matrix attached to the MoHo for the return trip from Ucluelet to the ferry in Nanaimo. This actually made a noticeable difference on the uphill and downhill sections. For those of you not familiar with Newtonian physics, it helped to keep the speed up when going up and it also helped to keep the speed down when going down. And that was all we were trying to achieve. The result was an infinitely more pleasurable drive. Ok, perhaps “infinitely” is a little too strong a modifier but let put it this way. I didn’t have to change my shorts when I arrived this time. And, as Newton would have predicted, there was a positive effect gas mileage as well. We dropped our consumption to almost 25 litres per 100 kms (9.5 mpg) versus the close to 32 litres per 100 kms (7.5 mpg) we “enjoyed” on the first leg of the trip out there. You know, you are in bad shape when you start bragging about using ONLY 25 litres per 100 kms.
Anyway, we made it to Nanaimo and were able to catch the very next ferry. Just enough time for a MoHo lunch once again. The ferry ride was awesome. This time we got a front-row-seat view of Vancouver and the Lions Gate Bridge with, of course, the Rocky Mountains as a backdrop. The Rockies were also the foreground to the north for most of the trip too. Soaking in this irrefragable splendor for the entirety of our 90-minute nautical trip all the way in to Horseshoe Bay, just north of the city, was a pleasure. I highly recommend introducing yourself to Vancouver from the water if possible. It is a magnificent experience that I am sure we would have savoured even further had we not just been overdosed with the beauty and majesty of both the Rockies and Vancouver Island. But we still loved it. Once we had disembarked at the port we pressed on across the top of the third largest city in Canada eastward to Chilliwack. Then we jogged a little south to Cultus Lake where our friends Carol and Neil had booked us in with some of their friends at a lakeside campsite. What a culture shock after a week on Vancouver Island. This place was hopping! We got in with enough time to get set up properly and then head to the beach for a family game of Frisbee as well as some Monkey in the Middle action. Carol popped by our campsite soon after they arrived and we got caught up a little before moving back to their site where Carol, Neil and their 4 friends were already relaxing around a campfire. The banter continued into the night. Chantal was wiser than I and opted for bed much earlier so here I sit at 1:00 in the morning updating the blog.

Today’s word:

irrefragable \ih-REF-ruh-guh-buhl\, adjective:
Impossible to refute; incontestable; undeniable; as, an irrefragable argument; irrefragable evidence.