MORNING COFFEE & SAIL COVERS: BOWEN ISLAND

BEACHCOMBING PARADISE: FOSSILS OF SOOKE

Sunshine, salt air, the bark of seals and... fossils await for those lucky enough to beach comb the fossiliferous shores near the fishing community of Sooke on Vancouver Islands' southwestern edge.

Sooke was originally inhabited by the T'sou-ke, a group related to the Salishan First Nations, who found the mild climate and sea access ideal. A fossil field trip brought me there last summer to explore the tidepools and well preserved marine fossils near the seaside exposures at Muir Creek.

Along the beachfront, you can find blocks of late Oligocene, 20-25 million year old, sandstone full of small gastropods, bivalves and barnacle bits of the Sooke Formation. By the late Oligocene ocean temperatures had cooled to near modern levels and the taxa preserved as fossils bear a strong resemblance to those found living beneath the Strait of Juan de Fuca today.

Mammal material, echinoids, coral, chitin and limpets are also found here but are rare. The largely intertidal assemblage of fossil species, many of which will look familiar as you've seen their modern relatives, tell us that the formation was layed down near shore.

The thickly strewn layers you'll see as big fossiliferous blocks and the lines of fossils you'll notice in the nearby cliffs suggest that they may have been deposited along a strand line. What you're sure to notice is the great ocean view and how easy it is to find something spectacular.

Whether you make a day of it or just a twenty minute luxurious beach stroll, your pockets will be filled with a healthy serving of ancient clam stew!

HALE CREEK: HARRISON FOSSIL SITE

PERFECT MISTY MORNING

DINOSAUR HUNTERS: TUMBLER RIDGE

HAIDA GWAII: RING OF FIRE

Located as they are in Canada’s most active earthquake zone, the islands of Haida Gwaii have had their share of shake-ups and scourings. Many of the Islands’ hillsides are scarred by slides and these geologic tales have made their way into the stories of the Haida First Nations who call these islands home. 

But the rock beneath speaks of an even more violent past. Very few people know that the rock here holds the key to a catastrophic event from eons ago. 

We’ve heard tales and seen images of the cataclysmic damage caused by meteriorites smashing into the Earth’s surface. Until recently, it was a meteorite impact that was blamed for the worldwide Triassic/Jurassic Mass Extinction. This wholesale dying out of species occurred some 200 million years ago. 

New evidence challenges the meteorite theory. Experts now believe that tectonic forces may have caused hundreds of volcanoes around the world to erupt simultaneously. The subsequent showers of volcanic ash would have altered the composition of the atmosphere dramatically and plunged the world into near total darkness for years until it settled from the sky. 

The picture painted of the sun flickering fitfully through inky clouds, paling against the torrents of glowing lava, while everywhere life is smothered, poisoned, or starved, rivals the most apocalyptic imaginings of Hollywood or religion. We know from worldwide evidence that the extinction was dramatic and affected upwards of 70% of the world’s biota. Perhaps counterintuitively, for one might think of water as a refuge from fire, smoke, and lava, it was marine lifeforms that suffered the most. 

This is particularly well documented in the rocks at Kennecott Point and Kunga Island. Radiolarian microfossils, tiny, siliceous, single-celled microrganisms, tell the tale. In the Upper Triassic rocks, which predate the extinction by about 10 million years, radiolarians are preserved in hundreds of forms. 

Just above them, in the early Jurassic rock layers laid down about the time of the great die-offs, only a fraction of the previous number of forms are represented. The more recent Jurassic rock shows a rebound of radiolarian diversity, though of course, in different forms, a diversity which continues to flourish and expand in today’s oceans.

AMMONITE IN CONCRETION

PEREGRINE CALM

VINS, HUILE D'OLIVE ET TRUFFLES

FOSSIL PLANT SITE: SLIDE MOUNTAIN

HMS ORIOLE: GANGES HARBOUR

MAGNOLIA HOMAGE TO EASTER

SUNFLOWER: HELIANTHUS ANNUUS

LIGHT ET CIEL

PEREGRINE BEAUTY: PREPARING FOR A SNICK

NORTHERN GULF ISLANDS

CHATEAU NEUF DU PAPE

SLIDE MOUNTAIN: SEED NURSERY

AMMONITE BOUNTY: TYAUGHTON

MAGNOLIA: 95-MILLION YEAR OLD TOOTHPASTE

A traditional Chinese extract from the bark of the magnolia tree, an ancient genus that goes back some 95-million years, gives you fresh breath by killing off the nasty oral microbes that cause halitosis.

My favorite individual tree is the magnolia growing on the grounds at Balboa Park. It is a magnificent example of the family Magnoliaceae and takes up nearly a whole city block. Older magnolia have this elegant quality of long draping branches, perfect for avoiding a predator while enjoying an afternoon's snooze.

Given that our ancestors decended from the trees, pre Lucy now it seems, and that we've seen bits of magnolia bark in firepits from 10,000 to 80,000 years ago, we may have enjoyed Magnoliaceae as a comfortable perch, hearth and perhaps even some additional oral benefits -- magnolia toothpaste anyone?

SAILING DESOLATION SOUND

Wind, waves and perfect anchorages await those lucky enough to spend time in Desolation Sound, a 30-square-mile premier cruising area and the province's largest marine park, due south of West Redonda Island on British Columbia's glorious west coast.

With the sun just peaking back in BC, a few friends gathered up supplies and plenty of sunscreen to get out and play in the wind up in Desolation Sound. Two of the days we were joined by resident killer whale and porpoise eager to join in on the surf.

Our crew enjoyed sunny, windy days and cool refreshing nights filled with fresh Pacific seafood bounty -- crab, oysters and salmon!

MUSEO DI STORIA NATURALE DI FIRENZE

FOSSIL BOUNTY: JET RANGER PALEO

PROUD PALEONTOLOGIST: SIVERT

STORM COMING IN: PADDLING LOCAL WEATHER

Like most mountainous areas, Bowron makes its own weather system and it appears you get everything in a 24-hour period. In fact, whatever weather you are enjoying seems to change 40 minutes later; good for rain, bad for sun. Wisps of cloud that seemed light and airy only hours early have become dark. Careful to hug the shore, we are ready for a quick escape from lightening as thundershowers break.

Local weather, and more importantly, wind, comes from a mixture of factors. Knowledge of the topography, the relative temperature of land and lake we paddle help predict how windy and soggy our afternoon will be. Today, the cooler air is flowing off the water up the forested slopes, heating and rising as it does so, creating a 5-15 knot intermittent force that turns ripples into small white caps.

We break for lunch to wait out the worst of it, knowing that the winds that started mid-morning will subside by late afternoon and rise again after sunset.

We snack on warm soup and flatbread, watching as our once crystal clear oasis turns to froth. Warm, dry and now with full bellies, we get back on the water.

We’re eager to push through to our next destination knowing that by nightfall the katabatic winds will arrive, as warmer air from the hillsides flows down and out over the chilly lake. We paddle in unison, enjoying the crisp air, confident that well before then we’ll be snugged in our tents sipping hot cocoa.

EARLY MORNING LAUNCH

VOLOUBILIS: ROMAN RUINS AND FOSSIL REMAINS

Voloubilis, a one of the pivotal cities in the expansion of Roman Empire, boasts a beautifully preserved basilica, triumphal arch, and columns of the Capitol Temple set against a backdrop of olive groves.

The area is also home to paleontological remains from ages past. Massive trilobites and enormous elephant bones have been recovered from the fossil-rich deposits and other sites have yielded clues to our ancestors.

The remains of H. erectus and other ill-defined (it could just be my bad Arabic) species of "archaic Homo sapiens," though not well-publicized, have been found at various sites around North Africa, in Algeria and Morocco.

AVIGNON

LIMESTONE AND LIGHT

SCARLET'S FLOWER