British Columbia – The Imperceptible Immigrant

Vernon (n̓łəłt̓pmíw̓scin̓)

July 29, 2026 by admin

In the Nsyilxcən language of the Syilx (Okanagan) people, “n̓łəłt̓pmíw̓scin̓“, means “jumping over place where the creek narrows”.

Before our recent trip to the Okanagan and beyond I really didn’t know Vernon at all. We drove through it once, as I recall, but that was the extent of my acquaintance.

The old friends in Vernon with whom we tarried a while on this trip were, by chance, the very first folks that The Girl introduced me to when she brought me to Canada way back in 2006. At that time these friends lived in East Vancouver. Some time later – having tired of the big city – they purchased a smallholding of somewhat more than twenty acres in rural Lumby in the BC interior. Here they enjoyed a bucolic existence until a couple of years ago.

Since then our friends have moved again – into a single-story dwelling in a ‘seniors’ village’ on the outskirts of Vernon. During the congenial couple of days that we spent with them they showed around the rural delights of this hitherto unknown (to me!) part of the province. Everything looked particularly verdant and prosperous and really most welcoming.

We did not actually dine at this stylish bar/restaurant overlooking the town, but the menu looked good and the views (the which we had specifically driven up to see) are spectacular.

The few days that we spend in and around Vernon were filled with fascinating diversions – for which we thank our friends most sincerely. This post is not sufficiently expansive to do justice to all of the sights that we saw, but I do want to mention two stops in particular.

The first was at Planet Bee, the which – as you may rapidly have surmised – is a fabulous honey farm. We could not resist making some purchases, not least of some of their glorious ‘Nectar of the Sun’ mead.

Pure indulgence!

We also loved the Davison Orchards. I am going to leave you to their website, as they can sell themselves far better than can I. Both of these operations (along with the Okanagan wineries – about which more in a subsequent post) exemplify the cornucopian nature of this fabulous part of the world.

I think that it may be a good thing that they are not within daily reach of our humble abode.

Kamloops (Tk’emlúps)

July 26, 2026 by admin

I have made mention on a number of occasions of The Girl’s heritage; of her birth and of her growing up in the city of Kamloops in the heart of British Columbia. Naturally our recent trip to the interior made that its starting point and a gratifying number of good folks – both family and friends – demonstrated their eagerness to re-unite with us and to catch us up with the various goings on in all of our lives.

Kamloops offers many dramatic vistas. This one is the view from the window of our room in the Coast hotel:

In addition to our rendezvous with the living The Girl and I paid a visit to the cemetery in Kamloops in which her mother and the ‘aunt’ (who raised her after her mother’s early and untimely passing) had been laid to rest in their turn. We have made this pilgrimage a number of times and the experience it is always a moving one.

This year we were not alone amongst the memorials. Some very new and delicate creatures were also taking advantage of the peace and tranquility there:

What did we miss.

July 22, 2026 by admin

‘”What did we miss?” is a highly popular colloquial phrase often used as a catchphrase in pop culture, on social media, and in the workplace. The phrase gained massive viral traction as a specific recurring meme across TikTok and Instagram, where creators use the audio/caption “What did we miss?” to express shock or confusion when logging back onto the internet after a chaotic news cycle or viral drama. Furthermore, the exact quote frequently surfaces in everyday conversation, podcasts, and television recaps when individuals are returning to work meetings or group chats and need to catch up on what transpired while they were away’.

So…

What did we miss?…

Well – it has been a very busy year thus far. Unexpectedly so. Since ‘The Immigrant’ went offline (temporarily) last month you might have wondered if all that busy-ness had finally caught up with us and that we had retreated to our sun-drenched garden – non-alcoholic beverages in hand – to catch some serious ‘Zeds’.

Nope! Not a bit of it. We set out instead on a road-trip to the interior of British Columbia, with the intention of catching up with old and dear friends and family – of prying open the portmanteau of anecdotage – and perchance even scattering a few ashes of remembrance in the light of the developments in the first episode of 2026.

The idea had been – of course. – that updates to the blog would be posted as we proceeded upon our odyssey, including – as is our wont – a plethora of evocative images designed to bring to those who have not been lucky enough to have visited the areas concerned a vivid picture of the terroir.

Well – better late than never… Watch out for exactly that over the next few posts.

Scene from our windows

October 19, 2024 by admin

(See what I did there?….)

Having a vista from one’s windows is a huge bonus and a blessing. Some folk prefer to live in the valleys (for protection one assumes) – other folk like to live on the hill (and thus be able to identify approaching threats). Of course, the latter option does also provide the dreamers amongst us with plenty of food for thought!

‘Anywho’ – (defined by the Urban Dictionary as: “An extremely annoying misuse of the word ‘anyhow’. Generally used by people who think they’re being clever“. Naturally, that just makes me want to use it!!) – this is simply a preamble to sharing some recent vistas as viewed from our casements.

You might want to double-click on these to get the full effect…

Enjoy:

Like a virgin…

October 14, 2024 by admin

This year saw the ninth anniversary of The Girl’s return to and my arrival in Canada. It further marks the start of my third year as a Canadian citizen.

It hardly seems possible that so much time has passed so quickly!

This week just passed marked yet another milestone; this being the first time that I was eligible to vote in an election here. Back in the UK quite a lot of folks (such as those from Commonwealth countries) are eligible to vote as long as they are residents in the UK. The Girl used to take advantage of this before she was granted her UK citizenship.

In Canada one has to be a citizen before one can vote in federal elections – hence my inability to do so until recently.

Anyway – I can now so do…

This current election is a provincial ballot and we here in British Columbia are – like so many others in the world – struggling to keep the nefarious tories at bay. This means voting!

In our neck of the woods we can vote early, so we trotted down to the polling station a week in advance of the final tally. On arrival I announced to all and sundry that this was my first Canadian election. The jolly lady there immediately sourced me a ‘first time voter’ sticker (just like being a teenager again!) which you can see adorning my voting card in the photo attached to this missive.

Voting here is quite slick. One takes one’s voting card and photo ID to the dude at the desk and one is ticked off the list in the prescribed manner and given a voting slip and a stiff plastic (or card – I forget which) sleeve. Having annotated the slip appropriately one inserts it into the sleeve – so that it can’t be read by others – and feeds it into the tallying machine. The machine sucks the paper out of the sleeve (which can then be recycled) and tallies the vote as it digests the slip.

All done and dusted, counted and ready to go. Most efficient and no loopholes for any possible suggestion of impropriety – though heaven for-fend that any such thing might be though even possible here north of the border.

And that’s how you do it, chaps!

Good travellers

August 30, 2024August 29, 2024 by admin

“A good traveller has no fixed plans and is not intent on arriving”.

Lao Tzu

Earlier this summer – some short while after The Girl and I returned from our momentous trip to Scotland – we were sitting in the sun outside the Stone House pub in Canoe Cove, chewing the fat and contemplating the remainder of the season.

We were minded to seek out some culture – in the form of theatre, music… maybe even fireworks… or indeed any combination of the above. We toyed with a visit to Vancouver for ‘Bard on the Beach‘ – particularly for it’s coincidence with the ‘Celebration of Light‘ – though that looked like turning into a somewhat expensive trip…

We also looked at the offerings here in Victoria – but nothing really caught the eye…

Finally The Girl came up with a smart notion. Come mid-August we could head up the island to Nanaimo, just in time for the Nanaimo Fringe Festival – the which fortuitously happened to coincide with the Nanaimo Blues Festival. We could make it a long weekend and avail ourselves of some theatre and some music – as well as paying a visit to The Girl’s mother in the process.

So – we had a fixed plan… the possession of which – according to Lao Tzu – is a ‘no-no’!

…as indeed it turned out to be!

This has been a busy old year – particularly for The Girl. When it came down to it we didn’t spot anything in the Nanaimo Fringe programme that looked unmissable – and she really didn’t fancy getting caught up in the the sort of crowds that the Blues Festival would attract.

We decided that we would make the trip anyway – but that we would modify the itinerary.

For the first of our days around Nanaimo we settled on an excursion to Gabriola island, where once The Girl’s parents had lived (well before I knew her) and the which we had visited with them on an early trip from the UK.

It was good to explore the island again. Here are some photos:

These last images are of the Malaspina Galleries on Gabriola. When I was first taken to this extraordinary geological feature – back in 2006 – The Girl’s mother took a photograph of the two of us which is still pretty much my favourite image of us together. It was lovely to be able to go back and stand in the same spot getting on for two decades later.

Snow angels

January 19, 2024 by admin

“When it snows, you have two choices—shovel or make snow angels”

Unknown

Following a number of false alarms Vancouver Island finally succumbed to one of the snow storms that have already been prevalent in other parts of the country. In the usual manner – and for the familiar reasons – the BC capital failed to deal particularly well with what was in fact not really a huge amount of snow.

Those further east – where the winter weather is considerably more serious (snows that fall in November or December may still be lying in February or March) – are won’t to sneer at us coastal British Columbians for our general feeb-like response to this natural phenomenon. We simply smile at them and point out that the six inches of snow that fell here on Thursday will be gone by the weekend – and in four week’s time the city’s streets will be emblazoned with spring blossoms.

Yah boo sucks!

Of course, that means I have to whip my camera out sharpish and dash off a few snaps. I really like the way the snow makes these images look like monochrome ones – with just the odd Spielbergian splash of colour giving the game away.

I loved the juxtaposition of the bright saturated colours of these flowers in our dining room against the black and white of the snow outside the window.

So late so soon

September 20, 2023 by admin

“How did it get so late so soon? It’s night before it’s afternoon. December is here before it’s June. My goodness how the time has flewn. How did it get so late so soon?”

Dr. Seuss

It is high time that I finished posting photos from our recent travels to a variety of locations around British Columbia (not all of which we had originally planned to visit!). Let’s see if I can wrap things up in this one post!

We spent a night in Nanaimo – largely so that we could have lunch with The Girl’s mother and a dear friend of ours from Duncan. Whilst there we also indulged in some retail therapy and I took the opportunity afforded by being on the 14th floor of the Coast Bastion hotel to take some pictures of a favourite subject of mine – float planes!

Well – they are something that we just don’t see in the south east of England!

From Nanaimo we drove up the east coast of Vancouver island to Courtney/Comox, adjacent towns in the Comox valley that I had somehow contrived not yet to visit. We really liked the feeling of Courtney – the which has a sort of artsy vibe somewhat akin to Salt Spring island (should one be in BC) or St. Ives (should one be in the southwest of England.

In spite of its charms I somehow I managed not to take pictures of Courtney (not sure where my brain went!) but I did take the camera on an excursion to nearby Mount Washington – ski and outdoor resort.

No snow at this time of year, of course, though no shortage of wildfire smoke.

This little chap is a jay known as a Whiskey Jack – the which is Canada’s national bird (who knew? – certainly not this recent Canadian)…

These apparently fearless little birds are not named with reference to the Irish grain-based alcoholic beverage, but from the Cree word ‘Wisakedjak‘. This makes the cheeky little fellow the only Canadian bird commonly known by a traditional indigenous name.

Here he is – ready for his close up:

Here he is – gone!…

Asking quietly

September 20, 2023September 6, 2023 by admin

“You don’t take a photograph. You ask quietly to borrow it.”

Unknown

The cabin by the lake in the North Thompson to which I made reference in my last post (which body of water I will refrain from identifying any more closely) is one of my favourite places in the world (as much as I know of it anyway) to take photographs. The constantly changing light means that from one minute to the next the subjects of my eager snapping metamorphose into ever more sensational phantasms.

For evidence of this supposition – see below. I strongly recommend clicking on the images to gain the full effect.

Log cabin

September 6, 2023September 4, 2023 by admin

“In Canada, anything that’s not in the city is referred to as a cottage. Or a log cabin”.

Dolores O’Riordan

As detailed in my last post – having fled the wildfires in the Okanagan The Girl and I took refuge in her cousin’s cabin in the North Thompson. There was still plenty of smoke from the Adams Lake fire just a few miles away on the other side of the mountain, but the lake and its surrounds were mercifully calm.

Naturally I had the camera with me…

These guys weren’t going to let a little smoke interfere with their wakeboarding.

We went out driving one day around Clearwater and Birch Island – this being the area from which The Girl hails. We worked our way back down the logging roads through Little Fort and Chu Chua and met this unexpected fellow traveler. Hard to tell who was more surprised…

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