The day Nick and JJ left us and headed back to their jobs in Regina, Nelson and I, along with Crystal and Jessie, caught the Salish Orca from Comox, Vancouver Island, to Powell River, on BC's Sunshine Coast. From there, we took the Island Discovery to Blubber Bay on Texada Island in the Strait of Georgia where we spent the night.
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| Texada Island, British Columbia, 2025 |
Our Airbnb sat high on a cliff. So high in fact, that the above photo only shows the bottom half of the stairway to the beach. So high up even, that you can't even tell that Crystal and Jessie are down on the beach.
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Texada Island, 2025, Strait of Georgia, BC
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But the girls are there. Crystal had climbed on top of the huge driftwood to take a photo of something interesting, while Jessie's attention was drawn toward the setting sun.
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| Texada Island, 2025, Strait of Georgia, BC |
This photo that Crystal took of Jessie on the beach shows a rock picker's paradise with Vancouver Island in the background.
The next morning we rushed around packing up our gear. It was going to be a wild day of ferries and driving between terminals as we explored BC's Sunshine Coast on our way back to Vancouver.
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| Island Discovery, 2025, Texada Island to Powell River, BC |
Our first goal was the 6:00 am sailing of the
Island Discovery at Blubber Bay, on the north end of Texada Island. The bad news was that we didn't make it by ten minutes. The good news was that we were near the front of the line for the 7:45 am ferry.
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| Sunshine Coast, 2025, British Columbia |
The ferry crossing from Texada Island to Powell River took 40 mins. Back on the mainland, we drove south from Powell River, following the coast to the ferry terminal in Saltery Bay. The coast was lovely, but with another ferry departure time hanging in the balance, we took photos on the go and didn't stop until we reached the terminal.
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| Malaspina Sky, Saltery Bay to Earl's Cove, BC |
We arrived at the Saltery Bay Terminal in good time for the 9:25 am sailing to Earl's Cove. The 50 minute trip on the
Malaspina Sky wove between islands giving different perspectives and a chance to seek out marine life.
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| Harbour Porpoise, 2025, seen from the Malaspina Sky, BC |
We were excited to spot a Harbour Porpoise in a small pod. We had seen whale blow holes on other ferries trips, but this was the first time we were close enough for a photo confirmation of anything from a ferry.
The ferry terminal at Earl's Cove is at the northern end of the Sechelt Peninsula. Once off the Malaspina Sky, it was a 90 min drive south to the next ferry at Langdale. Even though we had several hours to get there, we would still need several hours after that before we reached our next rental in Fort Langley, so we didn't dally and drove straight through Schelt which is on the isthmus that bridges the northern Sechelt peninsula with the rest of the BC mainland.
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| Davis Bay Beach, 2025, Sunshine Coast, BC |
We stopped to eat lunch at Davis Bay while eyeing the enticing beach across the highway. The Davis Bay Beach was empty of people, but full of rocks. Knowing our time was limited, we stretched our legs and cleared our stress away by walking the beach and hunting rocks. This wee stop at Davis Bay Beach was good for our health and spirit.
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| Molly's Reach, 1981, Gibsons Landing, Sunshine Coast, BC |
Following the Sunshine Coast highway, we wanted to make a brief stop in Gibsons to check out the harbour known as Gibsons Landing which is very familiar to anyone who watched one of CBC's longest-running shows
The Beachcombers which ran from 1972 to 1990. On our 1981 visit to Gibsons Landing, we took the above photo of Molly's Reach. Back then we wanted to see inside the Reach, but it had been closed due to the filming schedule, so we explored the boat slips and satisfied ourselves with several photos of Nick's boat,
Persephone, and Relic's old black speedboat.
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| Molly's Reach, 2025, Gibsons Landing, Sunshine Coast, BC |
On this trip, we drove through Gibsons looking for the Gibsons Landing harbour and the iconic Molly's Reach...and there it was....new paint...as big as life...the huge Molly's Reach sign at the end of the street. With tourists milling around, eating on the patio, coming and going, Molly's Reach was open for business. Jonny Harris had featured Gibsons Landing on a recent
Still Standing show, talking with the new owners of how cast members still swing by and autograph memorabilia.
And now another TV series is being filmed in Gibsons Landing with Molly's Reach playing a major location setting. Global's crime drama series Murder in a Small Town shows the local Gibsons flavour by not only keeping Molly's Reach as a cafe, but using the Gibsons Public Library as a working library and another frequently used location setting. The first season rolled out in 2024 and the show has been renewed for its third season for 2026-2027. Local flavour indeed.
We wanted to stop and explore more this time around, but we had another ferry to catch, so I took the quick photo above and off we drove toward the terminal.
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| Queen of Coquitlam, 2025, Langdale to Horseshoe Bay, BC |
We made it to the Langdale ferry terminal for the 2:05 pm sailing of the
Queen of Coquitlam and our 40 minute ferry ride across Howe Sound. We arrived at the Horseshoe Bay terminal in North Vancouver with a 55 minute drive to Fort Langley still ahead, and then realized we were smack in the middle of rush hour traffic.
It was evening when we finally reached our Fort Langley garden suite after an exciting day of travelling from Texada Island, down the Sunshine Coast, through the heavy traffic of Vancouver, Burnaby, and Surrey. Our new location was quiet, the weather calm, and oh...the lush garden that awaited us was a serene respite from the noise, stress, and rush of a very memorable day.
Check back on Oct 1st for more of our secret garden, as well as pics of Fort Langley and BC's film and shipbuilding industries.
This post matches the images on the September calendar page.
