This weekend Lina and I had the task of finding ourselves a place to get married next summer. This may not sound like a promising start for a tale of adventure... but don't worry, we managed to turn it into one.
We've been in touch with Cheyenne from Strongwater in the village of Egmont on the Sunshine Coast, north of Vancouver. The reason I knew about Egmont is that it's the place you go if you want to paddle your kayak at Skookumchuck. The last time I paddled there was ages ago, but it's a memorable place. We had intended to ride our bikes to Egmont, but the BC weather did it's worst and treated us to torrential rain, wind, and falling temperatures. We were weak and decided to drive over. We did take our running stuff and mountain bikes though. As soon as we got off the ferry the sun peaked out, so we went for a couple of hours ride in the rainforest. The Sunshine Coast trails are still fantastic, even when there's no sunshine.
The no-Sunshine Coast
Riding in the clouds
After that we made a few essential coffee and cake stops on our way to Egmont. Just outside Egmont we spotted a little swimming lake with a series of huge logs tied together with rope. The log contraption led out to a swimming platform. Of course I needed to try walking out to it. This turned out to be a bad idea and I gave up half way... though only got slightly wet.
Contemplating doing something silly.
We got to Egmont, and to cut along story short... Strongwater is fantastic. Exactly the place for us. We had a cosy little cabin for the weekend and chatted to some miners staying there who are building a hydro-electric plant underneath a lake up the valley. I suspect an evil villain's secret underground lair is actually what they're building... but you wouldn't admit that, would you.
On Sunday morning we ran through the forest to catch the (in)famous Skookumchuck wave doing its thing. There were a crew of paddlers dishing out the goods on the wave as it roared away. I need to get back on that monster some day.
Skookum indeed
After a chat with Cheyenne about wedding stuff and some fantastic tea, we set out on our final mission of the day... to feed Daisy the Duck. Daisy is the only duck on Klein Lake, and Cheyenne has been making sure she's doing ok. So, we set off in Cheyenne's canoe to find Daisy and deliver some bread. We paddled the length of the lake, and the breadth... and saw, not much. Not a duck in sight. Feeling a little guilty, we gave up and paddled back to the dock.
Paddling for Miss Daisy
There she was... like, err, a sitting duck! All the time we had been paddling all over the lake, Daisy was sitting waiting for us. Bah. There was some more sketchy walking along wet floating logs (no, I never learn) to get out to daisy's roost... be we made our bread delivery.
Hello ducky
Here she is
So, a successful weekend. We rode bikes, we ran, we paddled, and we found a duck. We also found a place that should be just right for us to get married. Exciting stuff.
