Rob Paterson is experincing some emergency conditions on PEI as the power has been out for a few days now. He has posted a great set of musings on 21st century emergency communications as a result. Some of these are quite adoptable to Bowen.

We awoke to ten centimeters of snow on the ground this morning. I was stranded at home, having failed to get to Regina last night, and took a few photos of the winter storm on my way back to the Vancouver airport.

• Miller Road
• Mannion Bay and Mount Brunswick
  
• Our house as seen from the ferry crossing Mannion Bay
• Anvil Island to the north
• Passage Island to the south
  

And finally, from the annals of "no small change goes unnoticed" BC Ferries has installed some new automatic gates at the Snug Cove terminal. I noticed that they left them open when we departed though.

Mordor (eye of Sauron is only visible at night)

While I am on a bit of a rant about greed, I should give a little update about the Gash on Black Mountain.

The Sea to Sky Highway is being upgraded to improve access to Whistler for the Olympics. A major piece of this is building a by pass over the top of Eagleridge Bluffs along the skirt of Black Mountain. Black Mountain lies across the Queen Charlotte Channel from us and the construction is 5 kms away as the raven flies.

They had the option of building a tunnel through the mountain or blasting a gash across it. The provincial government choose the "blasting a gash" option and destroyed a significant coastal bluff ecosystem and a beautiful arbutus grove in the process.

The work has continued unabated for months now. To build a four lane highway across the base of a mountain that is essentially a cliff, you need to blast a lot of rock. For some reason, they choose to do this at night. Last night, just as I was talking to Caitlin about how sad rampant greed was making me, there was a blast from the mainland that shook our house FIVE KILOMETERS away. It took 20 seconds for the sounds of falling rock to become silent.

Before, with all the blasting and cutting along Miller Road near our house I was comparing life here to living atop Vimy Ridge.

Now we just refer to the other side as Mordor.

The Eagleridge Bluffs Coalition website is still up and they seem to be still doing good work.

Another pristine day here on Bowen. Snow on the mountains and crisp sunlight everywhere. Took a few photos around Artisan Square this morning, waiting for Aine's singing class to end:

• Aine singing with her teacher Lynn Williams
• A sign explaingin Lynn's challenges in life...:-)
• Dessicated Oregon Grapes
• The front of The Galley Bistro
  

Off for 10 days to Whidbey Island and Regina, Saskatchewan. Will see how the island has changed when I'm back.

And on a happier note, George Zawadski is doing a huge community service with his launching on Bowen TV on YouTube.

Let's destroy this for profit shall we?

Had a great day down at Cape Roger Curtis with friends Neil, Keona and Jack Hammond. It was a beautiful day here, and the Cape was resplendant in winter light. Something sank in about the Cape and it's development. I had a strong sense today that this beautiful piece of land is in the wrong hands. I think there is nothing the current owners can do that will give me any assurance that they have the interests on Islanders at heart. They don't live here, they will not bear the consequences of what they do to that land and they don't care now what we think. They have bought the land to make money...money they don't need. In the process of developing and destroying the character of this land, they will create a return on their investment and never be involved with us again. Their legacy will be a housing development and an island full of regret.

The ownership group is now proposing that they protect most of the land at the Cape if they can build a village of 800-1200 residential units. That would nearly double the population of the whole island. It would tax our infrastructure, destroy the coastal ecosystems around the Cape and generally leave the island with a huge burden in exchange for keeping some of the land undeveloped.

Not to mention that developers don't build villages. Human communities build villages. Developers build "lifestyle locations."

Over the past several months, some unknown and condescending public relations consultant has been running full page editorials in the Undercurrent (and there have been terrific rebuttals) making it look as if the Cape's development proposals are sustainable and an excellent balancing of interests. Well, I've given up. These owners are untrustworthy and are operating solely on the basis of maximizing their money - money they don't need. I'm officially making myself immune to their stories. At every turn they want more. And they have no intention to live among us, pay the additional taxes their greed will create or participate in the future of the community.

i think the time for niceties is over. It's time to stop the butchery of this place for greed.

Join the Cape Roger Curtis Trust Society to save what we can before the windigos feed..

Back from Maui to nice cold winter weather. Seems that we missed some pretty decent rain while we were away, and a good windstorm or two. There were snow flurries today.

It's nice to be home.