Road Trippin’ BC: Sunshine Coast

It seems fitting that as I reflect on our time on the coast it’s dreary and grey and feels like summer’s over. Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing like being on the Canadian west coast on a sunny, bright summer day, but I lived in Vancouver for a short period of time, I know there are a limited number of those days! From Penticton we parted ways with the family. They loaded up to go camping and we headed to the coast. The fun thing about leisurely road trips is stopping in at those tourist destinations that you normally just pass by. On our way we made a stop at Hell’s Gate – an airtram and suspension bridge over “the most treacherous section of the Fraser River”

We road the airtram, . . . .  . . . . crossed over the suspension bridge, . . .  . . . . . sat in a big chair, and . . .  . . . . pretended we were in the airtram before we got into the actual airtram to go back to the top. The rest of the day was spent on the road following trains, going through tunnels, being stuck in traffic at Abbotsford (but getting to watch the airshow) and going through Vancouver.  Finally, we arrived at the ferry terminal to make our way further to the Sunshine Coast. Though the Sunshine Coast is on the mainland, it is only accessible by air or sea. It’s actually not that far from Vancouver, but due to the mountainous terrain, there are no roads accessible from here. That’s ok, ferries remind B-Rod of his time living on the island and that short period of time when I also lived on the coast, and we learned all the tricks of commuting back and forth by ferry.  We spent a couple nights on the Sunshine Coast. When we arrived it was hot and sunny (and had apparently been that way for the week), but on our first full day it went from slight sun to cloud covered and having to wear sweaters and shoes with socks 😕 The day we left it was going to return to sunny and hot! It didn’t actually rain much, so we spent a lot of our time just heading out on some easier, leisurely hikes. Our home base was Sechelt where we were lucky to get accommodation as there was a car show happening there over the weekend. We started out by hitting the farmer’s market, the car show and wandering around a bit. Some of the other things we got up to on the Sunshine Coast included:

• Taking walks to just be surrounded by the rainforest and the ocean. This was high on B-Rod’s list as he misses living on the coast. Even on the cloudy days, it was magical. We ended up walking around places like Smuggler Cover, Cliff Gilker Park and Secret Beach (sshhhhhhh!)
• Fluking out and and getting to Skookumchuck Narrows at the right time for the tide so we could sit around and watch whitewater kayakers and surfers play around in the rapids.  
• Stopping in at Roberts Creek (our favourite town we came across in the area) where B chatted it up in a bike shop, we hit the farmers market and checked out the community mandala which is repainted by residents every year.
• Having breakfast at Molly’s Reach in Gibsons Landing. This is where “The Beachcombers” was filmed. Though I vaguely remember it as a kid, B-Rod has very vivid, fond memories. He was so excited he could barely contain himself!
• Going a couple times to a brewery we both really liked, to try their different brews and have some kom-brew-cha.

We’d love to go back to Sunshine Coast someday. I’d love to experience the sunshine and go kayaking and B-Rod would like to try some of the bike trails. So after having a small taste of the coast, we headed back inland for a long day of driving to Kimberley. We had been fairly lucky with not having a lot of smoke during our trip, but our luck had run out as we headed out on the smoky roads all the way from the coast to the interior. We spent our last couple nights in Kimberley. I’ll admit I was a bit biased about this town, so we hadn’t spent a lot of time there before. I discovered that it’s actually a great area. The trip of chillaxing continued and we didn’t do a lot. We  did go on a bit of a wander and hike but didn’t really take any pictures. It was just nice to visit with B-Rod’s brother and sister-in-law AND to be fed well every day all day (perks of having a sister-in-law chef).  We left Kimberley a few days before the evacuation alert in the area. So sad to see this beautiful province on fire!

Our summer travels looked a bit different than we thought they would be, but it was a wonderful two weeks with family and friends in beautiful British Columbia. This province rocks and if I’m being completely honest, it was really difficult to come back to Alberta. But, BC . . . . we WILL be back again!