MyWestworld

Bowen Island: One Man’s Eco-Quest

Posted on 19. Feb, 2010 by BCAA.

How I built an eco-shed, ditched my SUV, alienated the in-laws and changed my life forever
My name is James, and I drive an SUV. It is a golden-pearl Premium Edition Lexus rx-300, with all-leather interior, genuine walnut wood dash, seven-speaker Nakamichi sound system, seat heaters, moon roof and sport racks. It is a high-riding icon of luxury, a mobile conspicuous-consumption statement, a prosperity public-address system – the sort of vehicle that valets named Chip park in front of five-star Indian fusion restaurants. Let me be clear, though, that the rx-300 is not an indication of my hard-won success as a writer. It’s a hand- me-down from my father-in-law, who offered it to my wife, Elle, and me as a gift just as our 1994 Volvo station wagon threatened to die with our two tired babies in the backseat some night on a lonely New Mexico byway well beyond the fringes of Sprint-Verizon’s digital safety net.

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Stikine: The Great River

Posted on 19. Feb, 2010 by BCAA.

Stikine River Country is raw wilderness. Its headwaters region, the wildlife-rich Spatsizi Plateau, is North America’s equivalent to Africa’s Serengeti Plain. In its mid-region, the mighty river continues to deepen the spectacular 100-km-long Grand Canyon, which has only once permitted the passage of humans. The Stikine’s estuary, with its broad-fanned delta of layered silt, is a vital and irreplaceable migratory bird stopover along the Pacific flyway.

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Vancouver Island: Travels with Taste

Posted on 19. Feb, 2010 by BCAA.

Fast forward almost a decade and McAree is head of Travel with Taste, B.C.’s first culinary tour operator – leading locals and international travellers into the West Coast food culture of Vancouver Island. Her specialties: walking tours in her home city of Victoria (“urban foraging,” as she calls it) and longer treks to the farms, wineries and under-the-radar restaurants of Salt Spring Island and the Cowichan Valley.

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Salt Spring: A Gulf Island Getaway

Posted on 19. Feb, 2010 by BCAA.

FOOD & WINE
Founded by liberated slaves and later favoured by hippies, today Salt Spring is the first Gulf Island that comes to mind when ex-Toronto power brokers think “retirement cheese making”
by Daniel Wood

As it turns out, this moment contains everything that follows. Three round mounds of goat cheese, each originally the size and shape [...]

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