Because west is best
Trip Start
Aug 28, 2010
1
8
17
Trip End
May 03, 2011
Bamfield, British Columbia, Canada
Friday, October 1, 2010
Oh and i have also been consuming a lot of pancakes...though not with maple syrup - sad times indeed.
On the more exciting front (exciting for me anyway...maybe not so much for you) last weeknd I went on a fieldtrip with some first year biology students and a third year algae and fungi course (even though im not doin either) to Bamfield Marine Science Centre which is sssssooooo fffaaaaaarrrrr. ok its not really that far, but part of the road is more track than road so it took longer than it should! The bus broke down briefly (as happens in all good journeys) though not for too long, but we did end up arriving in the dead of night. Still, the centre folk werent to be deterred and gave us a tour of the facilites (which didnt take long-its pretty small) before giving us the 'if you see a bear dont cuddle it and dont run away like a tit into the woods' talk followed by 'theres a cougar on site but we havent seen it in the past few days so it might have gone, but if you see it your fucked' talk.
Next morning we were up at the red eye for brekkie and broken off into groups (mine had only 7 people in it - i was put with the algae lot) into some temperate rainforest (old growth and new growth) to go find us some fungi. And fungi we did find! some of it turned out to be suitably deadly but as far as im aware, noone has died so i think it was a successful jaunt. We then spent some time at the local event of the month - the mushroom extravaganza, which although was suitably mushroomy, lacked in extravagance. So there was a table sporting some fine paper-mache mushrooms made by the kids at the school and some mushrooms that folk had collected. There was also a lady selling jam, and another lady (who had the finest knitted hat in the style of a mushroom) selling potatoes. That was kinda it.
After lunch it was a trip down to Eagle Bay (on the other side of the inlet) for a general rummage around followed by a boat for play with some old skool oceanography equipment (sucky discs, hand-held temperature/salinity probes) and a spot of plankton netting at various points. And we were lucky enough to see seals, sealions, grey herons, river otters, banded kingfishers and bald eagles which was all funky stuff.
The evenings entertainment consisted of a lecture on algae which was surprisingly entertaining...but I guess anyone who is known as the 'kelp king' probably isnt gonna be one of those stuffy scientist types who bore you with the ins and outs of gametophytes (if you dont know, dont ask...its really kinda dull). That was followed by admiring the plankton cycles, which involved lots of 'whoa check out this l'il dude - hes soo cool' from the less serious people of the group (ok just me - but lets pretend im a proppa science type person for a few moments).
Next day was another red eye start and off to another beach (Bradys for those who know the area) for another mooch around. It was pretty awesome down there - some seriously big anemones and star fish - ohh and the teeniest tiniest urchins you ever did sea! there was also some wierd algae that you can allegedly use as an exfoliator but im not so convinced. unfortunatly we had to leave that afty to get back to Victoria - and the ride back was so very very long BUT because it was daylight we did get awesome views of those infamous BC fall colours before hittin civilization in the form of Port Alberni (where we stopped for a cuppa - and I had an incredible hot chocolate...mmmm hot chocolate.....)
