“Anyone Who Says Sunshine Brings Happiness Has Never Danced In The Rain.”

Perhaps appropriate for how I’m feeling right now. We’ve been having lovely sunny weather and I’ve been feeling a bit anxious about the cold and wet returning along with fall. Why should I want to avoid it?! It can be a lovely time of year and  I do enjoy photography when it’s overcast.

We stayed at Lucy Island for a cold, wet weekend back in July. Were you wearing down coats and rain gear in July? I didn’t think I would be. Regardless, it was a steller weekend!

We found many treasures at low tide, including this moulting crab that was sadly dead.

A lot of time was spent around the fire. It was just too wet at times to be out on the beach. Our fire was on the edge of the forest so we had some extra cover from the trees. With some added tarps above it made for a cosy and fun spot, especially for the kids.

The food is always good with friends. Cam and Keith caught a halibut for supper one night. We cooked part of it over the fire and part of it in a pan on the stove. That night we also ate pan fried potatoes and I made a veggie chilli. A damn fine spread.

This is my and Leif’s tent in the trees and you can see Cam and Lily’s tent just over the hill. We’ve talked about getting a big family tent in the past but have decided that we enjoy the flexibility of smaller footprints. We would have been hard pressed to find a good spot here on Lucy, which also wouldn’t impede the evening arrival of Rhinoceros Auklets coming home to their dens, if we’d had a bigger tent. I like that we can go to remoter locations and need less space with these two small tents than having a large one. One day I expect Cam and I will be in one and the kids in the other.

The eagles made a fine showing for us this weekend. I suppose that’s no surprise, since this is their home. I was SO excited to see the groups of eagles, five or six at a time, searching the beach on foot at low tide in the mornings. I was so excited that I didn’t take any pictures of it. : /

It was foggy much of our time on the island.

Out for a walk one morning on my own, I came across some very upset Oyster Catchers. I realised I must be close to their nest as I scrambled over the rocks. As I was retreating, I found it! In fact, I almost missed it at first. The eggs looked like many spotted oval rocks found on the beaches here. I was so pleased to get a glimpse of the unassuming nest and was sure to let everyone know that we should avoid this area completely.

You can click on the picture of the eggs to take you to my Flickr stream where you can see a few images of the agitated Oyster Catchers.

It almost felt like I was in another world.

The forest is incredibly lovely.

But then so is the beach, especially at low tide. Here you can see anemones (which make us think of watermelon for their rich green and pink!), huge veins of quartz and very large barnacles.

We went for a walk one day with the plan of rowing over to a small island for lunch. We’d have to do it in two or three trips with our two families and three dogs. Cam, Lily, Leif, Hayden and I made the first attempt to cross to the small island. It proved to be further than anticipated and we were hampered by Oscar and Kep trying desperately to swim to us instead of waiting with Erin and Keith on shore. We had to contend with huge beds of bull kelp floating in our way and ended up turning around because the dogs struggled even more than the boat and were tangling in the kelp. I began to worry about Oscar who wasn’t totally able to keep his head above water as his legs pumped hard to swim. I was able to grab him around his neck and kept his head out of the water while he swam but he was clearly tiring quickly. We couldn’t get to shore fast enough for my liking!

Plans changed and we had lunch on another, closer beach instead. The tide was coming in but we were able to examine a wall with sea stars and many small water filled crevices overflowing with hermit crabs, teeny jelly fish and chiton.

Erin and I decided to bushwhack our way through the forest to the other side of the island. From here it’s a walk over a long isthmus, some rocks and we’re back at our beach. We thought it would be no problem since we’ve been in this forest many times before. Blow down and spring growth made it not so easy bushwhacking! We did find salmonberries to help nourish us along the way however. By the time we fell out of the bush on the other side with twigs caught in our hair and wool sweaters, I was questioning whether Cam and Keith were already on their way to rescue us.

What’s a visit to Lucy island without a walk through the forest to the lighthouse? It’s easy walking on the new boardwalk.

I’ll never tire of time spent on Lucy.