Mount St Helens

• A highlight of my trip to Portland was visiting Mount St Helens in southern Washington State. It was an incredible experience; very moving and actually kind of scary since the volcano is still active, with smoke wafting out of the gaping crater and grit carried by the wind that felt like sandpaper on my skin and in my eyes.

• We drove to the Johnston Ridge Observatory which is within five miles of the still-steaming lava dome. The Ridge and Observatory are named to honour David Johnston, a young volcanologist who had joined the Mt St Helens monitoring team stationed at Vancouver, Washington State, when the mountain came to life in March 1980.

• Although the prevailing scientific opinion was that Mt St Helens would erupt in an upward column, Johnston correctly predicted that the blast would instead be lateral and originate from a bulge developing on the north side of the mountain.

• Johnston wasn’t supposed to be on the ridge on May 18^th 1980 but he had volunteered to replace a colleague who needed time off to go for a job interview.
  

• At 8:32 a.m. on that fateful morning, a rumbling 5.1 magnitude earthquake triggered the massive eruption that, within seconds, reduced Mt St Helens from 9,677 feet to 8,365 feet and replaced the mountain’s near-symmetrical snow-capped summit with a mile-wide horseshoe-shaped crater.

• The roar of the blast was heard up to 200 miles away and David Johnston's excited voice crackled over the radio link from his observation post – “Vancouver! Vancouver! This is it!”

• In a continuous thunderous sweep, the shockwave from the blast traveled horizontally at speeds above 670 mph. A hurricane wave of scalding gases and fire-hot debris reaching up to 800 degrees, raced down the mountain at speeds up to 200 mph. Everything in the direct blast zone -- natural or manmade, and including David Johnston -- was obliterated within seconds.

• Fortunately, the monitoring team had persuaded authorities to limit access to the area around the volcano and evacuate surrounding towns, thereby holding the May 18 death toll to 57 instead of thousands.

• I can’t recall how many days it took for the awesome grey blanket of smoke and ash to reach Winnipeg, some 1700 miles to the northeast but I do remember riding my bicycle to work at the university wondering what was causing the early morning fog-like haze.

• As I stood on Johnston Ridge contemplating the events of 1980, I couldn't help but wonder why they let people get so close to a volcano that has the capacity to, within seconds, incinerate the very spot upon which I was standing. I felt I just had to trust that volcanic science has greatly improved during the intervening years.
  

• My inquiring mind wanted to know what became of the colleague who David Johnston had replaced at the observation post. His name was Harry Glicken. Eleven years later he was killed in a volcanic eruption in Japan.

Two Days in a Swell Place

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  With a regional population of 2.3 million, supplemented annually by millions of tourists from all parts of the globe, Vancouver, BC is consistently rated as one of the most (if not the most) livable cities in the world. Although it is a mere 90-minute ferry ride from Victoria….essentially in my back yard…I rarely go there except to visit my children. Go figure.
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  Thanks to my friend Morlene, Vancouver made my “must-go-there list” for July. Morlene and I became friends when we were both lucky enough to be living the good life in Vancouver’s West End where cross streets run water-to-water between the Vancouver Harbour waterfront and English Bay. Lazily watching the sun sink below the horizon of the Pacific Ocean from the beach is a West End summer evening ritual. Although we’ve both moved back to Victoria, Morlene maintains a little hide-away in Vancouver, with a million dollar view, and she invited me to spend a few days there before once again heading south to the US.
  
  Like two fancy tourist ladies heading for a grand adventure, we joined the rush of lookie-loos dashing to the side of the BC ferry at the mere mention of “pod of whales off the starboard”. It must be a tough life being a whale; constantly chased by tourist-filled rubber zodiacs and subjected to the loud, deafening drone of ferry whistles.
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  We headed straight for the West End and did our standard walk; west on Denman to the beach then east on Denman with a pit stop at The Cupcake Store where, per usual, it was too hard to pick just one so we bought four. With cupcakes and a take-out pizza to share with my son, Jamison, we headed back to Morlene’s hide-away and, in one of our best West End traditions, popped the cork on an accompanying bottle of champagne.

• Vancouver’s Granville Island was once a grungy industrial district. Today it is a super-trendy major attraction for tourists and locals alike. Within walking distance from the hide-away, we meandered through the maze of the fruit/veggie/flower/food market, restaurants, specialty shops and art galleries. Even though the artists charge outrageous prices for their artwork and offer to ship their wares anywhere in the world, there didn’t appear to be many takers and I wondered how the heck they make the rent.
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  Next up was dinner with my daughter Jodi at Felicia’s, a tiny Italian restaurant in the East End. Loaded with “atmosphere” - red-checkered tablecloths draped over small tables, a mishmash of artwork and famous-clientele photographs crowded onto brightly painted walls, the dynamic Italiano owner/cook/waitress/ dishwasher is actually named Lucy. Always wearing her floppy white chef’s hat, Lucy can talk you into whatever pasta she made fresh that day, and if necessary, she will chase you down the street with forgotten leftovers, which she assures you with great certainty, you are going to have for your next day’s lunch. Jodi and I mentioned that we were once Felicia’s regulars, Lucy claimed she remembered us and wants us to come back more often.
  
  Visiting Vancouver just-because-I-can and frequenting Felicia’s are on my list of must-do-more-often list.

The Zela Street Gravel Party

• Throughout the course of reporting my travel adventures on this blog, I have occasionally mentioned “roadside saints”; people I met along the way who were there when I needed them to fix a leaky water hook-up, spot an about-to-blow tire, save the life of a stranger, return a lost wallet, or restrain a violent passenger on a bus.

• This posting is about “roadside saints” in my hometown.
  

• For the past several weeks as I have been whiling away the hours in Victoria, a top priority has been spending time with my friends Peter and Leslie. Peter is currently off work, courageously and with incredible fortitude, awaiting stem-cell treatment for recurrent lymphoma.

• Peter and Leslie have a wonderfully welcoming home, almost completely surrounded by the incredible and peaceful garden they have avidly created and nurtured over many years.
  

• In the office, Peter's post-weekend reports almost always included the number of barrowfuls of dirt, gravel, fertilizer, etc. he had wheeled from one part of the garden to another in accordance with Leslie's meticulous plan. A happy beneficiary of Peter's and Leslie's dedication to plants, flowers, bushes and trees, my visits to Zela Street always start with a garden tour of inspection

• Last weekend I had the pleasure of being the official photographer at the "Zela Street Gravel Party". It was an incredible delight to watch as four guys from the office - with big hearts and great legs - extended their helping hands to move a mountain of gravel from Peter's driveway to the side of his house.

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• These smiling, eager heroes showed up with shovels and wheelbarrows and made short- though sweaty - work of moving that pile of gravel before retiring to the porch for cold drinks and guy-chat.

• Although I haven’t missed being at work during the past 8+ months and – shocking as this may sound - am not looking forward to the end of my year off, I must say that the best part of work was, and always will be, the people. People like John and Rob and Stu and Dave (who doesn’t actually work with us – but that’s not the point) and Darlene – roadside saints in my hometown; people I am lucky to know and proud to count among my friends.

Summertime Celebrations

• It is hard to believe that it’s July and the days are flying by faster than ever!

• Canada Day was spectacularly hot and sunny. Like many of my fellow Canadians, I donned a red shirt and white pants to wander the few blocks from home to Victoria’s Inner Harbour. The harbour was jam-packed with boats and the streets were grid-locked with people. A wild violinist fully dressed in a black Darth Vader helmet and caped costume, “Plaster Man” whose clothes, hair, hands and face are completely coated in white paint, and a flaming-sword swallower were among the buskers competing for spare change donations. The walkway around the harbour was lined with displays of local arts and crafts. Enticing smells of barbequed wieners, popcorn and candy floss wafted through the air along with the jingling tunes of an ice-cream truck.

• By late afternoon, the increasing roar of the crowd could be heard all the way up to my 12^th floor apartment. At 1030 pm I stepped out onto the balcony to watch fireworks explode over the harbour. There were helicopters circling overhead and after all was said and done the police helicopter continued to circle, shining a spotlight down onto the street. Every time it looped around, the spotlight eerily shone right into my bedroom. The next morning’s news featured the troublesome drunks, many of them teenagers whose parents were likely not-amused to see their off-springs’ ugly behaviour featured in the media.

• To celebrate the 4th of July, my roommate Patti and I invited a few friends over for some all-American food; hot dogs, potato salad and apple pie. When I lamented not being able to find any USA themed decorations, an American friend enthusiastically donated a bag stuffed with all manner of small flags, stars’n’stripes streamers, and even a windsock. Patti acquired a huge American flag and downloaded some American music. As each American friend entered the red, white’n’blue bedecked apartment, the Star Spangled Banner was played and everyone stood up in tribute.

• The next morning I walked down to the Inner Harbour to see the Harbour Ferry Ballet. As “The Blue Danube” is blasted out across the water, five little harbour ferries bob and weave amongst each other in time to the music. The ballet is a Sunday morning ritual during July and August, and I decided I better get down there and mingle with the tourists before summer is over and I’ve missed it completely.
  

• The next travel adventure begins on July 14: destination Portland, Oregon, via Amtrak from Vancouver. Although best known for their trains, the stretch from Vancouver to Seattle is travelled via ….dare I say it…..bus. I’m hoping that a person’s “bad bus experiences” are limited to two and that I got my share out of the way.