Owls and Raptors at Boundary Bay

Sunday we had to do a bunch of running around and ended up down near the ferry terminal at the big mall. After getting everything done we still had a few hours of daylight and the rain had mercifully stopped. So we decide to head down to Boundary Bay to see what might be around on this early winter afternoon. We ended up with a pretty great day, with lots of owls and raptors to entertain!

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Some Fun Times Around Vancouver and a Week Off on Galiano

This post is a bit of a catch up. There’s been lots going on over the last month or so with no downtime to write it all down or post. We’ve been doing lots around the city, I took a week off from work to head over to Galiano to catch up on some projects and as part of that trip was able to swing by Victoria for a day and a half to catch up with some friends. It’s been busy but fun!

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A Fall Visit to Reifel - We Scored an Owl!

It’s been a while since I posted much - getting through the Europe posts and getting through the over 3,000 photos I took on my proper camera in Europe has taken a lot of time. This will be a shortish, photo-heavy post of a recent trip to Reifel. We got very lucky with birds of prey on this trip - eagles, hawks and an owl! We also made a short stop at the farm on Westham Island, which was all decked out for Halloween.

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A Last Day in Lisbon, then Home with a Short Stop in London

We’ve finally made it - the last full post from our trip! I’ll try and get to proper photos soon, but for now, let’s wrap up the journey.

We had half a day to explore Lisbon further before heading to the airport to start the journey home. We were stopping in London which gave us the chance to meet up with Justine’s parents and her family friends for an entertaining night out.

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Welcome to Porto!

In all my trips to Portugal, I had never been to Porto. I’m not sure how that’s possible - I love port and it’s always been known as a great city. And after this visit, it’s certainly cemented as an amazing place to come back to explore further. We only had a couple of days to explore Porto and we filled them up. This one will take a couple of posts to cover off.

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So Long Scotland, Hello Portugal!

This a short one today - one last quick trip into Edinburgh, then off to the airport for the trip to Portugal. After spending a very short night in Lisbon, we hopped in our rental car and drove to Porto, exploring the countryside and making an amazing stop in Obidos along the way. There were some good photos along the way…

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Departing Islay and Exploring Edinburgh

Sadly, our time on Islay had come to an end. Two days was not nearly long enough and I am definitely wanting to come back. There’s so much more to explore and I need to play that golf course again. We had to make the drive back across Scotland, and the plan was to do it fairly quick in the hopes of exploring a bit of Edinburgh before catching our plane to Portugal on Thursday.

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A First Day on Islay - Golfing, Hiking and Scotch!

The reason we were on Islay was mostly to do with me. Justine loves Scotland, but I love the scotch that they make on Islay. It is typically peaty and smoky, and I love it! There are many distilleries here, with a history dating back as far as anyone can remember. The official distilleries date back to the early 1800s, and I was hoping to get to see as many as possible. But we also wanted to do some other things, including some sightseeing and hiking in the Scottish countryside. It was a lot to try and pack into a couple of days. And we had the notorious Scottish weather to deal with.

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Scotland: Sunday - The Trip to Islay

For today’s post, we’re traveling from Edinburgh across Scotland to the west coast to catch our ferry to Islay. There was a fair bit to see along the way, as we gave ourselves lots of time and planned to make a few stops to explore. The weather was OK - not great, but not miserable either and we got to see some of the spectacular Scottish scenery.

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Planes, Trains and Automobiles… Our European Adventure

This is the first post of many of our trip to Scotland and Portugal. I assume it will be the first of many, and I think I’ll follow the same approach as our summer road-trip - start with the content and photos from my phone, and add more photos later. We had an amazing time, saw lots of new and interesting places and had great family time along the way.

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