Ski season

A bright spot in an otherwise dark year...

 Our local mountain has opened for a new season of skiing. It was crowded the day we were there, probably from a combination of holidays and people weary of being housebound by COVID.

The resort had COVID protocols in place that everyone seemed to be respecting. The day was warm with a blanket of recent snow on the slopes... a near-perfect start to the season.

Untold story

Owner gone missing...

Recently I passed a bench in an empty bus stop. Perched on top was a hat and a pack of cigarettes. It's hard to imagine the circumstances that would cause a man -- I'm assuming it's a man -- to abandon these.

Order from chaos

What is the meaning of these mysterious piles of beach stone?

What do these primitive stone totem poles indicate. A need to create order out of nature? A need to create art to contemplate? Signposts that simply say: "I was here."?

Who knows?

These cairns line the logs and shoreline of Parksville's main beach.

The Haunting

"Whatever walked there... walked alone..."

This Halloween season Netflix has been streaming The Haunting of Hill House, a one-shot 10-part series inspired by Shirley Jackson's creepy 1959 book.

In the series, Hill House looks very similar to local landmark Hatley Castle. Hatley Castle is familiar to some movie fans as the Mutant Academy in the X-Men and Deadpool movies.

Of course, any castle has to have its share of ghosts and Hatley Castle is no exception. I spent numerous nights sleeping in the castle back in the day when it was a military academy. I had my share of creepy encounters during those nights, but only one that I would consider to be truly supernatural. One was enough...