Your Japanese word of the week is...

"ame" 雨 which means rain.  Even the pictograph kanji looks sort of like water falling from clouds.  That's the interesting thing about kanji...  they seem to bear more resemblance to what they're representing the simpler the kanji.  Although, on second thought, maybe that's not overly surprising...  Anyway haha...

What I meant to talk about was my recent trip up to Lund on the Sunshine Coast.  It's not particularly far but you are at the mercy of the ferries, which means early starts and, if you want to make sure you get home, earlier returns.  But we actually stayed the night in Lund so that made it much more relaxing.

As you can see, quite a lot of twisties which makes the drive rather fun.  The roads on the last leg up to Lund get a bit more broken but for the most part, it's nice and smooth which is always comforting.

After arriving, we had a bit of time to relax and around 6pm, we (me, my parents, and 7 others) all boarded a boat that one of them chartered.  It's basically a privately owned charter company and the owner/operator will plan out a tour based on what you want to see.  You can do multi-day trips, you can do a short half-day or full-day trip to anywhere to see or do anything.  If you want to go fishing, he'll take you to some great fishing spots.  If you want to see waterfalls, he can take you there as well.  For us, we went on a tour around Desolation Sound which included a dinner prepared by his wife (they run the business together).

One of the surprises of the boat trip were the prawn traps that our guide laid out the day before.  The haul wasn't particularly large (though more than enough for the 10 of us) but the more adventurous of us ate a few fresh from the traps.  I must say, they're particularly delicious like that haha.....  very tender with just a tiny bit of the sea salt flavour.

Of course, no trip through a provincial park would be complete without a lot of wildlife being spotted.  Highlights include seals and dolphins (the latter which I wasn't fast enough to grab a shot of) and bald eagles.

And this rock which resembles a seal...

With all that done, we headed back to the quaint shore-side hotel which had one of the most comfortable beds I've ever slept in.  Although that could also be due to the long day that we had...  who knows heh....  oh, also, if you manage to be in Lund on a clear day, the sunset is amazing I'm told since the pier faces west and looks out towards Vancouver Island.  Unfortunately for us, we were hampered by clouds...

The next day we headed back with a stop at the Ruby Lake resort.  And, despite the occasional downpour, what started as a brief rest turned into an all afternoon photography session by everybody because of the sheer amount of flowers and interesting bird-related items hidden around the acreage.  In fact, the resort's a bird sanctuary so going on a clearer day would probably net you quite a few bird sightings if that's your thing.  Here are a few of the flower pics I took.

Capping it all off was lunch at the Italian restaurant at the resort where the chef served us an absolutely delicious meal of pasta with a seafood platter of mussels, scallops, prawns, and clams in a tomato sauce.  As always, there's something to be said for simple, hearty, skillfully prepared meals.

And that was it- a pleasant two day trip right in our own backyard.  It's actually easy enough to get to that I'm considering going again.  It's even possible to head out to the restaurant for lunch and easy make the ferries back for home...  and it's worth it too!

Anyway, now that September's hit, it's back to the normal life which includes yet another season of Pacific Spirit Karate.  We've got some changes coming along and one of them includes a blog which will be online in a few weeks.  So check back for that!