Horseshoe Bay to Tofino, Episode One
25 vi 06 Sunday
Left Bowen on the 8:30 ferry; the entire Mackay-Cole clan turned out to see me off. I was told that I simply must return at the end of my journey; the Mackay-Coles will have just returned from their trip south into California.
I looked back over the railing of the ferry as Snug Cove receded in the distance of the bright morning: the kayak rental shop, which during the business week pumps out reggae; the stores clustered against the hill above the marina; the heron flying low above the trees; cormorants on the rocks outside the cove...
My instructions from Moose Travel Network: "meet the "Pacific" Tour departing Vancouver on June 25th, confirmation #65790. Total fare is $869 CAD payable first day of travel. Please ensure you are at the Horseshoe Bay Ferry Terminal "Foot Passenger Pickup" are by 10 a.m. on June 25th. Your driver will pick you up from that location prior to your boarding the ferry. Do not buy a ferry ticket as your driver will do that for you."
Having crossed from Bowen Island to Horseshoe Bay, I exited the terminal and began looking for the "Foot Passenger Pick-up" area. None of the terminal staff appeared to be very clear on where that was. As 10 a.m. approached and I had seen no sign of a Moose Travel Bus (having, however, only a very poor notion of what such a bus would look like), I called the main office of Moose. This required me to do a bit of unpacking and repacking, but by this point I was used to that, having done it three times in the Vancouver Airport two days before!
Laura from Moose was typically willing to help, but unfortunately she also was unfamiliar with the exact location of the "Foot Passenger Pick-up" area. The difficulty, incidentally, is that there is no such area. Foot passengers typically enter the ferry separately from vehicle passengers. That a foot passenger might meet a vehicle, even a bus, at the ferry or on the ferry, is apparently so rare an occurrence that a protocol does not exist for it.
Something for BC Ferries to consider.
Laura did, however, describe the driver and tell me his name. So I was looking for Lee, who has really short hair. Not much to go by, true, but more than I had before. I closed my mobile, turned back toward the terminal, and noticed a man with somewhat short hair and what appeared to be a stack of tickets in his hand looking back and forth around the front of the terminal. I approached him, asked him whether he was Lee; he asked whether I was Mark, and of course then everything was fine. Lee commented that the terminal was too large not to be more specific in instructions as to where a passenger should wait.
Something for the Moose Travel Network to consider.
The Moose bus was parked in one of the lanes waiting to enter the Horseshoe Bay to Departure Bay ferry, but it was too hot to wait inside the bus, so I stood outside with the other Moosies, who had had an hour or so to make each others’ acquaintance already. I talked with some women with accents I couldn’t quite place. At this point in the tour I was wearing my Pennsylvania College of Art and Design ID badge, as a little shout out to Chris Welch, Chair of the Photography Department at the College. (No, sorry, Chris, no-one got a shot of me actually wearing the badge, I’m afraid, but I did at first. I also always carried some toilet paper in a ziplock bag, my toothbrush and toothpaste, and a Swiss Army knife [Victorinox]). Anyway, the badge proved to be a good icebreaker, and I ended up talking with some fellow academics, but the terminal was – and probably still is – a less than ideal place for a conversation. Very noisy and windy.
About half an hour after my arrival at the bus, we were ushered on board: three Japanese women, a Spanish man, two women from eastern Canada (one of whom spoke faultless Spanish), several English women, and two Swedish couples – the fellow academics, who had been at global sustainability conference in Vancouver. For some more information about their activities, see http://globalsustainability.org
We were informed that because of the rising costs of petrol, a surcharge would be added to our fare for the bus tour; this would be $2.00 for those taking the shorter tour of Vancouver Island, and $5.00 for those of us, such as myself, who would be taking a more extended tour.
Left Bowen on the 8:30 ferry; the entire Mackay-Cole clan turned out to see me off. I was told that I simply must return at the end of my journey; the Mackay-Coles will have just returned from their trip south into California.
I looked back over the railing of the ferry as Snug Cove receded in the distance of the bright morning: the kayak rental shop, which during the business week pumps out reggae; the stores clustered against the hill above the marina; the heron flying low above the trees; cormorants on the rocks outside the cove...
My instructions from Moose Travel Network: "meet the "Pacific" Tour departing Vancouver on June 25th, confirmation #65790. Total fare is $869 CAD payable first day of travel. Please ensure you are at the Horseshoe Bay Ferry Terminal "Foot Passenger Pickup" are by 10 a.m. on June 25th. Your driver will pick you up from that location prior to your boarding the ferry. Do not buy a ferry ticket as your driver will do that for you."
Having crossed from Bowen Island to Horseshoe Bay, I exited the terminal and began looking for the "Foot Passenger Pick-up" area. None of the terminal staff appeared to be very clear on where that was. As 10 a.m. approached and I had seen no sign of a Moose Travel Bus (having, however, only a very poor notion of what such a bus would look like), I called the main office of Moose. This required me to do a bit of unpacking and repacking, but by this point I was used to that, having done it three times in the Vancouver Airport two days before!
Laura from Moose was typically willing to help, but unfortunately she also was unfamiliar with the exact location of the "Foot Passenger Pick-up" area. The difficulty, incidentally, is that there is no such area. Foot passengers typically enter the ferry separately from vehicle passengers. That a foot passenger might meet a vehicle, even a bus, at the ferry or on the ferry, is apparently so rare an occurrence that a protocol does not exist for it.
Something for BC Ferries to consider.
Laura did, however, describe the driver and tell me his name. So I was looking for Lee, who has really short hair. Not much to go by, true, but more than I had before. I closed my mobile, turned back toward the terminal, and noticed a man with somewhat short hair and what appeared to be a stack of tickets in his hand looking back and forth around the front of the terminal. I approached him, asked him whether he was Lee; he asked whether I was Mark, and of course then everything was fine. Lee commented that the terminal was too large not to be more specific in instructions as to where a passenger should wait.
Something for the Moose Travel Network to consider.
The Moose bus was parked in one of the lanes waiting to enter the Horseshoe Bay to Departure Bay ferry, but it was too hot to wait inside the bus, so I stood outside with the other Moosies, who had had an hour or so to make each others’ acquaintance already. I talked with some women with accents I couldn’t quite place. At this point in the tour I was wearing my Pennsylvania College of Art and Design ID badge, as a little shout out to Chris Welch, Chair of the Photography Department at the College. (No, sorry, Chris, no-one got a shot of me actually wearing the badge, I’m afraid, but I did at first. I also always carried some toilet paper in a ziplock bag, my toothbrush and toothpaste, and a Swiss Army knife [Victorinox]). Anyway, the badge proved to be a good icebreaker, and I ended up talking with some fellow academics, but the terminal was – and probably still is – a less than ideal place for a conversation. Very noisy and windy.
About half an hour after my arrival at the bus, we were ushered on board: three Japanese women, a Spanish man, two women from eastern Canada (one of whom spoke faultless Spanish), several English women, and two Swedish couples – the fellow academics, who had been at global sustainability conference in Vancouver. For some more information about their activities, see http://globalsustainability.org
We were informed that because of the rising costs of petrol, a surcharge would be added to our fare for the bus tour; this would be $2.00 for those taking the shorter tour of Vancouver Island, and $5.00 for those of us, such as myself, who would be taking a more extended tour.
posted by M E Achtermann at 7:46 pm
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