A bit of a warning… You’re going to see a lot of beach photos coming up below.

By the summer 2022 portion of the pandemic, my Atlantic Canadian soul needed to spend some significant time sitting beside a fairly substantial body of water. With that in mind, we planned out our Vancouver Island explorations with a few days at a cottage overlooking the Strait of Georgia. Immediately on driving up to the place I could feel my pulse slowing down. My wife and I glanced at each other and with no words passing between us we both knew we had made a perfect decision on location.

As the sun set on our first night in Qualicum Bay we walked the beach with the tide starting to go out. This was a walk we would do a number of times.

And in the other direction…. just as beautiful. I’ll take a brief break from this idyllic waterfront location as we got up to a few things around the area over our three days. But don’t worry, we’ll be back to this beach and the view that played an oversized role in this part of our vacation.

In Qualicum Beach, a short drive down the road from our cabin was the lovely Fern + Cedar Brewing Company. Delicious craft beers for me and an amazing selection of gluten-free bar snacks that enticed my wife to spend a couple of visits to this place so I could try every beer they made. Below is what we ordered up for dinner our first night in the neighbourhood. Even the broccoli was incredibly tasty!

We loved everything so much we made another visit back here for some more snacks on a lazy afternoon. You can tell that I’ve definitely settled into a west coast beach vibe.

Speaking of lazy afternoons, somewhere along our journey I picked up my namesake beer and cracked it open while relaxing back at our cabin with a view of the water. This was a pretty tasty IPA made that much better with the view.

Something that made our overall Vancouver Island trip special was that everywhere you turned there was beauty. Whether it was the beaches or the long inland drives, the cities, small towns or the long stretches in-between, it felt like we were living in a postcard for about two weeks. One of the locations that filled me with the most awe was Little Qualicum Falls.

We got an early start for a hike and there were not too many others around. We had the sounds of the rushing waters, hushed slightly by the canopy of trees, and the crunch of the gravel under our feet as company.

This park was tremendously beautiful. There are certain places on my travels where I feel a specific type of peace that is sometimes difficult to find elsewhere. Little Qualicum Falls noticeably slowed my heart rate and calmed and filled my spirit.

Best of all, I got to share this experience with the love of my life who makes everything better.

On another day, our adventures took us to the Old Country Market in Coombs. Very nice market and we picked up some snacks for later in the day, but the draw was that this market has…… goats on their roof. To be technically correct, on this smoking hot day, they only had one goat on their roof, but that alone was still a first for us.

From there, my wife and I went separate ways for a couple of hours. Her to a second wildlife sanctuary of this trip; me to the Mount Arrowsmith Brewing Company for some beer tasting and to get lost in a book. Nothing here wowed me but all the beers were solid. The hazy pale ale on the far right was the best of the bunch.

And now to return to the beaches portion of this post….

My wife picked me up, full of tales of adorable animals, and we made our way to Rathtrevor Beach Provincial Park. Lots of folks were out enjoying the unseasonably warm weather made more comfortable by the wind whipping down the strait. We hiked the beach a bit before heading back to our cabin….

… because our cabin had this amazing bottle of bubbly we picked up outside Victoria earlier on our travels. We settled into our patio chairs and sipped away while staring off over the water. Throughout our stay here we talked frequently of coming back year after year. We had truly lucked into a perfect place.

One of the mornings I was awake well before sunrise and decided to make a cup of coffee and sit on the deck for a while. Watching the sky brighten to the east and listening to the light waves crash on the beach mingled with the odd call of a family of ducks was sublime. I finished off my coffee, went back to bed, and later awoke to my wife making bacon. Talk about a perfect morning!

To round out an already perfect stay, our hosts popped by with their dogs on our last night knowing we were missing our dog back home. These two were super playful and energetic and loved being around my wife.

But this one stole my heart. According to her humans, she was very skittish and distrustful of anyone other than them. The husband of the couple let her out to see if she’d join us, and after a few minutes, cuddled up to me to everyone’s amazement. The hosts were dumbfounded when she approached me, gave me a kiss, then sat down right on my hip and let me pet her. This place was already perfect, and now it was even better that I had made a new friend.

The dogs and their humans said their goodbyes and we spent the rest of our last evening with a fire, a few drinks, a spectacular sunset and watching some cruise ships sail past in the distance. A perfect way to end the relaxing middle portion of our Vancouver Island trip.