Touring (a corner of) the BC mainland

After six consecutive years we decided to give Pacific Playgrounds a miss this year and go further afield for our main camping trip. Nothing against our regular spot, but it was time for a change, and we’d often talked about showing the kids some more of this vast province.

This expedition took more planning than usual if we wanted to avoid horrendously long days of traveling, so we booked short stays near Vancouver on the outward and return journeys, and two longer stays in the Interior. Ali is our family travel agent, and she was close to tearing her hair out looking for decent spots with good facilities on the days we needed, but a plan came together in the end.

We have a well-worn routine these days when setting off for camp. The trailer is loaded and ready during the days beforehand, and hitched up ready to roll the night before. This just leaves the last-minute ritual ferrying of bags of groceries across the drive as we empty fridge and larder, and we’re away.

Usually this marks the start of a long drive, but we live just a few minutes away from the ferry terminal so the majority of that first journey was actually spent on the ferry. No great hardship, because the Swartz Bay to Tsawassen trip is a calm and picturesque glide between islands with views of rugged coastlines and occasional wildlife.

Once on the other side, we’d forgotten what a long trek it was through the suburban sprawl of the Vancouver environs, but memories came flooding back as we hit the open highway and headed into the countryside of the lower mainland. A short while later, we were onto minor roads and our first stop at Cultus Lake.

4 nights at Sunnyside campground, Cultus Lake

A large campground with generous pitches set in trees, and a long stretch of beach on the lake. I think when we arrived they must have recently had rain because first impressions of the pitch were dark and damp, but the ground soon dried out and we know from experience to value shade in a typical BC summer.

Overall, this was a lovely campground that we’d be happy to return to in future years.

The kids enjoyed paddling their kayaks out on the lake, and just a few minutes’ cycle away there was a water slide park and a small but beautifully-laid out adventure park, which happily occupied two of our afternoons. The best part about these out-of-the-way parks was that, apart from a couple of rides, there were no line ups for anything so with our all-day passes it was uninterrupted enjoyment with little time waiting around.

Megan spent a couple of hours on this ride alone

To be continued ...

Tiamat's Nest

Weather forecasting is a life-or-death profession, and hard sciences and technology are all that keep people alive and fed. Anthropologists, soft and useless, rank slightly below politicians and telemarketers on the social scale. This sucks for Charles Hawthorne, Professor of Anthropology.

Worse yet, his research into human behavior has discovered how human history ended up on its current miserable course, and the perpetrator is hell-bent on keeping it hidden.

Worst of all, with everything mechanical under computer control, the most innocuous device is a potential murder weapon to a well-connected villain.

After a series of deadly near-misses Charles flees to the wilds of Greenland where the global network has yet to reach. But to deal with the threat, to save himself and his family, Charles has to confront technology full on and enter the even more hostile world online.

Freeing humanity from a lifetime of slavery comes as an added bonus.

# # # # #

Release date: August 30
Price: $2.99 after release, or pre-order now for $0.99 
at Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Kobo.

I appreciate any help to spread the word. If you mention Tiamat’s Nest on your blog please drop a link in the comments here with instructions on how to contact you, and I’ll get you a free e-copy once the book is on general release.

If you’d like to do a pre-release review (on your blog, or on Amazon or Goodreads) please let me know. I’ll get you a PDF of the text ahead of time, and a free e-copy of the official version once it’s released.

Many thanks to those of you who’ve already offered mentions and guest posts. I’ll be in touch next month when I return from vacation.

Selfie revenge

Ever been out as a family and your teenage daughter can't stop taking selfies of herself and her friends?

Us oldies can play at that game too!

Family-friendly

When Ali & I toured BC twenty years ago, long before we moved here and before we’d put serious thoughts to starting a family, one of the strongest impressions we had of the place was family-friendliness.

Everywhere we went, we saw facilities, parks and playgrounds, and people having fun as a family. This was a stark contrast to the “adults only” and “children should be kept out of the way” attitudes back home, which we had never even noticed as (at that time) a childless couple.

Every so often, I’m reminded of that childlike attitude to fun that prevails here - one of the drivers for our move over ten years ago. We’ve just returned from the Canada Day parade through Sidney this morning. Yesterday evening we watched a glorious fireworks display from the Sidney pier. I was struck yet again by the happy and casual atmosphere throughout the town as all generations mingle in a friendly and trouble-free atmosphere.

Long may those attitudes prevail.

Happy Canada Day.

Phew! It’s getting hot!

It’s been a glorious spring in this part of BC, and summer is kicking into high gear this weekend. Don’t know how long it will last, these spells of 30+ tend to last only a week or two each year around Victoria, but for now it’s barbecues and salads alfresco.

With one thing and another, my plans to get everything finalized this month to release Tiamat’s Nest early July took a hit. Seeing as we’ve also got some summer camping planned I’ve now settled on a release date at the end of August.

If anyone would like to help spread the word, I’ll be posting more details as soon as the final cover is ready. Meanwhile, the e-book is now available for pre-order on Smashwords at an introductory price of $0.99.

So, how’s your summer going? And do you have any unique or adventurous vacation plans?

Memory lane

Things have been quiet on the blog recently for a couple of reasons.

First, I'm letting life settle back to normality after a week-long trip to my old home in Guernsey, UK. This is only the second time I've been back since moving to Canada, and the last trip was six years ago. This will probably tell you that this is not a journey I choose to make for my own pleasure. Both times were to celebrate significant family anniversaries.

I was not looking forward to the traveling. It's long, tiring, and we are regularly regaled with stories of how airlines treat their paying passengers as nothing more than cattle to be herded into the smallest possible space, so I had visions of traveling conditions deteriorating even further over the last six years.

In the end, things weren't nearly as bad as I'd feared, and the trip as a whole was a good experience. The downsides were the inevitable fatigue of so much traveling for such a short spell - barely over jet lag one way before it's time to turn around and head home - and endless waits in airport lounges, shuffling in line at check-ins, security, passport control, baggage reclaim...

On the plus side, I was pleasantly surprised by the Air Transat flight. Although airline seats are not designed to fall asleep in, at least I didn't feel like my knees were pressed into my chest the whole way. And we were served relatively decent food, with a complimentary glass of wine - something I really didn't expect in cattle class!

It was good to reconnect with family and some old friends, and to revisit a few places. Things haven't changed much over the years, apart from a bit more development squeezing out the last few open spaces. The big change has been in my own perceptions. Having grown used to open spaces, few crowds, and courteous drivers, getting around the island was intimidating to say the least.

As an added bonus, I was able to meet sci-fi artist Chris Foss, who has a home and a studio in Guernsey. Chris's cover art for Azimov and E.E. "Doc" Smith books, amongst others, has had a big influence on my own work.

The second reason for staying offline (I did say there were a couple) - I'm busy finalizing Tiamat's Nest for publication. After a few back-and-forths with the book designer I think we're very close on the cover design, and I'm working through a final round of edits on the text. I'm hoping to release the e-book next month, with the paperback to follow shortly after. More information to follow in due course...

No, I'm not a robot

I've just encountered a new level in online annoyance.

The dreaded Captcha is being replaced on some blogs by an innocuous check box saying "Please prove you're not a robot".

Up to now, on blogs I've visited this simply involves clicking on the box and posting the comment. This morning's, though was different.

When I clicked on the box, up popped a new form that at first I thought was an irritating pop-up advertisement for something to do with cookery. After a few second's hunting for a way to dismiss the intrusion, I realized it was part of the verification process.

I was presented with a dozen pictures of food, and the instruction to click on all those that involved pasta or noodles. Sounds easy, except the images were too small and grainy to confidently tell in many cases what they were pictures of. I tried, but didn't find enough to satisfy the beast and it gave me a new test. Ice cream this time. This was easier because they were more obvious, but there were clear cultural assumptions at work. Who outside of North America, for example, would know that a round carton with a big "DQ" on the side needed to be clicked?

In my view, this now officially surpasses Google+ and Disqus in the "pointless ways to piss off your readers" stakes.

I can guarantee that if your blog inflicts this on me I will not be leaving a comment.