Winter, 2019/2020
During our summer tour, we talked on and off about perhaps trying to find rental accommodation for this coming winter. We thoroughly enjoy being in our rig, Ali, all 120 sq ft of it.
For Jen it is advantageous - walking distances are short. For me, I have my chair and ottoman set up so I can do my hobbies. For both of us, Ali is just fantastic - we can stay for as long as we want or move to the next location whenever we feel like it
On that note, after returning to Cape Lazo RV Park on Oct. 1, we decided to kick it into high gear and get serious about finding a place for the winter. If we can find a suitable place, I might be able to do a few things in Ali that need looking after.
The third ad I responded to was for a cottage in Royston. The main house sits on 1 acre of waterfront. The 500 sq ft cottage, recently renovated, sits at the corner of the lot close to the dead-end road in front. We loved the cottage and its location. The couple who own the property had no problems with us storing our trailer next to the cottage.
We moved in Tuesday Oct 15, exactly 3½ years to the day we started our full-time travels in Ali back in Feb. 15, 2016.
What follows are some of our adventures during our stay in Royston. I reno'd Ali during our stay.
Guess what is at the north end of Gartley Point Road. If you said, Gartley Point you would be right!
On Nov. 26, I travelled south to our storage locker. Admittedly the Inland Island Hwy has some elevation along its inland rout, so I was not surprised to see this starting... and continuing as I arrived at our storage site.
Here we are walking out to the point...
On the walk out to the point, we walked past a backyard full of chickens, ducks, geese, goats, and pot-bellied pigs.
And looking back from the start of the walk...
A few days later, our good friend Donna arrived for a weekend visit.
After our walk around the Courtenay Air Park, we had lunch at the Kingfisher Resort, just south of Royston. I just had to share these pictures. Talk about presentation!
And for dessert...
The Kingfisher was setting up their Christmas light show. Unlike many light displays, these were all fake plants illuminated by LED lights. You might think such a display would be tacky, but it was very cool.
Here are just a few pictures of the many I took.
Click on the pics above to see a larger view. Quite this display!
In early December, we dropped by the Hightide Pub for dinner. "Pub" was the operative word but boy were we surprised by the food and the presentation.
Then on December 10, a neighbour invited us to his wreath-making party. Apparently this is an annual event. Lots of food and drinks and make your own wreath, free of charge.
On Jan 10, our front drive looked like this: and 5 days later, we looked out on this:
We put our winter boots on and walked to the start of the path out to Gartley Point. Mmmm, nope, let's head home.
I got my exercise the next day shovelling the driveway!
And 3 days later, we were back to this.
Then in early March, this happened:
We killed some time while we waited for Donna at the airport.
Friend Donna was coming to visit, so I baked some gluten- and dairy-free chocolate muffins.
A little ray of sunshine in late January:
Gartley Point at high tide:
Mucking about in the tidal pools. Can you find the crab??
Here's a relic of Royston's past - a piece of rail from a bygone era.
Because of the pandemic, we extended our stay at the cottage into May.
Our daily walk usually took us out to Gartley Point.
Spring has sprung and so have the Rhodies at the Courtenay Airpark.
When Jen returned from the UK, life returned to normal.
We drove to Bowser one day for a coffee in the sunshine.
Jen headed to the UK to continue her genealogy research. This was just a week or so before the COVID pandemic started shutting everything down. One day, while Jen was away, I walked around the Courtenay Airpark. That's the Comox glacier in the picture on the right.
We are getting closer to leaving on our 2020 summer travels. Almost the last order of business was a new housecoat for me. I went looking for fabric as I had not been able to find a housecoat to buy, so I figured I could make one. Jen suggested the fabric I chose was not something I could sew easily so she stepped in a put this together for me. Thanks, sweetheart!
Towards the end of our stay at the cottage, I did some work on both Ali and Alfie. This link takes you there (more for my documentation).
So that pretty much sums up our 7½ month stay at the cottage.
