The Imperceptible Immigrant

Like birthdays

September 29, 2025 in Life as we know it | Permalink

“Anniversaries are like birthdays: occasions to celebrate and to think ahead, usually among friends with whom one shares not only the past but also the future”.

Zbigniew Brzezinski

Before I get stuck into the list of subjects that I have been ignoring for the past couple of months (as discussed in this last post) here is one more topic that I really should have touched upon before now.

For The Girl and I, 2025 is something of a year of significant anniversaries. When we moved to Canada back in 2015 we stayed initially (and for for several months!) with friends of ours here on the peninsula. This gave us the opportunity to search for a new home of our own – but also gave time for the shipping container loaded with all of our worldly possessions to traverse the globe before catching up with us here on the west coast.

During the summer of 2015 several months of feverish but abortive house hunting left us wondering if we were going to find ourselves with a container full of treasures but nowhere to put them. Several offers on properties fell through before we finally placed an offer on what is now our lovely home, following a single viewing on the very day that the house hit the market

A glance back at my calendar for the period reveals an event on the 29th September that is simply titled “House!“. Yes – this very day is tenth anniversary of our moving into our Canadian home.

Back at the end of July this year there was another significant celebration for The Girl and I – that of our fifteenth wedding anniversary. That event is irrevocably tied to yet another celebratory occasion – this year being the twentieth anniversary of our first having met.

I firmly believe that it is fitting to acknowledge our great good fortune by marking these milestones – even though it does also make one realise just how quickly the time is passing.

We are most grateful to have things to celebrate – and friends with whom to celebrate them – in the face of all of the troubles in this precarious world.

Tags: Anniversary, Canada, Celebration, The Girl

But wait – there’s more!

September 27, 2025 in Flotsam and Jetsam | Permalink

OK – so today’s post-topping quote might appear at first glance to be apropos of nothing at all, but a moment or two’s reflection would surely reveal that it is, after all, entirely apposite.

I was – as usual – hunting online for a suitable aphorism with which to head this post when I came across this little gem. It made me chuckle, which is – at the end of the day – the most important thing, so in it goes!

Now – what is the post actually about?

Regular consumers of the Immigrant’s scribblings will not have failed to notice that the past few months’ worth of postings have been focused pretty much entirely on photographs of our splendid trip to and through the glorious Rocky Mountains. Given that The Girl and I have been back in Victoria since the end of June there must – clearly – have been a fair bit else about which I could – and probably should – have written.

Time to catch up. There is a fair bit to tell.

Over the summer and into the autumn we have organised for ourselves a smorgasbord of cultural experiences. Future posts will touch upon a number of theatrical events at which we have been present. The musical scene must also to be considered and reported upon. More on both of these subjects in future posts.

We are fortunate in that we have been able to spend more time in our garden than has been feasible in some recent years. Good friends have obliged us by accepting our invitations to join us in enjoying the facilities. This is, after all, the reason for us having them.

I think it would probably be a good idea for me to glance back through my calendar to check that I am not missing any other important topics. I can think of at least one matter upon which I should report – and which has been overshadowed by my all-consuming focus on waxing lyrical about The Canadian and the Rocky Mountains.

More to come soon!

Tags: garden, Holiday, Home, Music, Theatre, Travel

Malaspina Galleries

September 19, 2025 in Flotsam and Jetsam, Photos | Permalink

It is high time to wrap up this extended sequence of posts that aim to offer the gentle reader a photographic glimpse of our travels in Alberta and British Columbia back at the start of the summer. These excursions will stick in our minds for a long time but one of the joys of maintaining an online journal such as this is that we can refer easily to such shared memories from many years back. Just yesterday The Girl and I were refreshing our reminiscences of a stay in the Perigord back in 2013!

Anyhow! As we came back down the island following our sojourn in Port Alberni we took time out to spend a few hours on Gabriola island. I have written a little before about our connection to this small island off the coast of the much larger one on which we live and some of these images may already be familiar – but I include them anyway for completeness.

These photos are of the incredible wave-worn rock formations on the northern tip of Gabriola island – the Malaspina Galleries. With our guests we spent a happy interlude exploring the extraordinary formations and textures that the sea and the wind have wrought over the centuries

Nothing more to be said. Our expedition in June to Banff, Jasper, Vancouver and points north on the island was hugely enjoyable and fully lived up to the hopes and expectations that we had for it.

Happy travellers!

Tags: Gabriola Island, Holiday, Photo, Travel, Vancouver Island

Becoming an island

September 16, 2025 in Flotsam and Jetsam, Photos | Permalink

“No, the safest thing is to become an island. To make your house a citadel against all the garbage and ugliness in the world. How else can you be sure of anything?”

Nickolas Butler, Shotgun Lovesongs

When we arrived back on the island from our expedition to the Rocky Mountains earlier this summer, one might have expected that to have been the end of our adventuring (for the time-being anyway). Such is not, however, in our nature and The Girl had planned and organised for us a further trip ‘up-island’.

I have written and posted photos before concerning our favourite day out on the water from Port Alberni – the voyage to Bamfield upon the supply ship the MV Frances Barkley. This will doubtless not be the last time that I post images on this subject but it is the latest such.

Enjoy:

In my experience most new visitors to Canada have as their number one must see attraction… bears! Herewith – on the shore of the Alberni inlet – a mother with two cubs. Mission accomplished!