Day 49. Thursday 6 October.

A very special day for our family.

7 weeks ago today we left home and we’re on the flight home at midnight tomorrow. It is time to be back home with those we’ve missed (we’ll need to do some much shorter travel to catch up with some of them as soon as we can manage it).

Horseshoe Bay is a very small jumping off point for ferry services to Vancouver and Bowen Island – and not much else. A few shops, including a couple of very promising fish and chip outlets. The bus ride was much longer than we’d anticipated, and even though the driver thought he was Daniel Ricciardo, we just missed the 12.10 ferry (admittedly, we could have arisen earlier). Next ferry not until 14.35, so plenty of time to tour the town….and again…..and again.

Bowen Island is advertised as a place for arts and crafts. Very low key and it was quiet today, no doubt due to the drizzle and the close of the season as winter threatens. Again, the trees, the hills, little pockets of bays….beautiful.

Back on West Van in the early evening. Tried for a fish and chips meal that we’d been hanging out for at a fancy restaurant called Troll’s – great name. But a 30 minute wait put us off so headed for the ‘Best Fish and Chips in Town’ café across the road – the cod and chips was indeed great and came in record time.

The return bus ride was on the Express. The friendly driver said that the rain would set in for a week. This is really the first inconvenient rain we’ve had on the whole trip – not that it really inconvenienced us today. First stop was ours, so home to begin packing. We’ve organised for our bags to b picked up at 10 AM and delivered to the airport at 7.30 PM – hope we see them again!