Malaspina Coach Lines Trip to PR / Westview

[Retrovision]

I hope to get to, or through, Powell River this Summer, if not, make another similar trip.

My plan has me travelling from HSB to Langdlale by the main ship, on the first sailing, taking transit to Sechelt (one single bus), and then taking Malaspina Coach Lines to either Powell River, or to Saltery Bay, aboard the soon-to-be retired (or become out-of-our-reach) Queen of Tsawwassen.

This can work on a frugal budget, and is intended to give the sense of added value for your dollar, which, in this day and age, with our reliance on the internal-combustion-engine, and the monopoly that the oil dealers give themselves, is such a necessary sacrifice that many of us feel we have to make. Just think of this idea as "Graham's 30 hour tour - of BC Ferries"

I'll expand on this idea later...

Cheers,
Graham'

[Neil]

Graham- sounds like you're doing a day trip, albeit a very ambitious one.... if you had a chance to stay over, I believe Powell River Transit has very limited service to Texada Island, or at least they did last time I looked. Bus is probably a good way to do the trip you're doing, as I find the highway just south of Earls Cove is so windy, I never get a chance to enjoy it when I'm driving.

[Retrovision]

Indeed they do have transit once a week, last time that I checked, to Texada, as well as, now, once a week service to Lund, even. Actually I was trying to portray less of a challenge to those who might immediately not like the idea.. but I was hoping to make it something where I got to see the NIP, as well as the Queen of Burnaby in service; let alone possibly making a circle of the trip, and going from either Courtenay to Victoria or Nanaimo, or from Buckley Bay (that is connected by transit to Courtenay/Comox), after taking a trip on the Quinitsa, to Vic / Nanaimo on the VIA Rail RDC trains. (Rail-Diesel-Car / Self-Porpelled).

What I'm offering is to give you folks the opportunity to do all of this at about (probably) half the price, or so.

Cheers

[Neil]

People should be more aware of what they can do on transit. There is now a pretty good transit system in the Comox Valley, and Parksville-Qualicum area. The Comox Valley buses, and the VIA train, stop right by the Buckley Bay terminal for Denman & Hornby.

[Mike C]

There's a bus in Comox that goes BC Ferries-Airport-Courtenay.

[Airchime]

Hmmm, ambitious indeed!

Even if you just want to SEE the NIP and Burnaby......you're looking at an overnight in Powell River if you go up without a car. The Malaspina bus you ride up on becomes the last departure southbound for the
day. Nothing till early the next morning!!

How about a Sunshine Coast Circlepac? Without a car? Defineatly a 2-day trip.............

Malaspina drops you off around 1400, a ride over to Texada and back and overnight in Powell River. The Burnaby over to Comox the next morning, transit into town and on to the train station, E&N to Nanaimo or Victoria. If you get off in Nanaimo, the local Transit Exchange is right there. The #2 takes you right to Departure Bay. The Victoria Station is right downtown. Local transit or PCL to the ferry.

I'm not sure how you'd get from Buckley Bay to Nanaimo or Victoria (if you decide to make the stop). Greyhound maybe?

I don't mean to sound pro-auto Graham (the 2-day trip sounds like a neat idea). I just want you to see how tough it would be to make the schedule work in just one day.

Alan

[Mike C]

airchime said:

I'm not sure how you'd get from Buckley Bay to Nanaimo or Victoria (if you decide to make the stop). Greyhound maybe?

Alan

the E&N stops there, lol

[Airchime]

the E&N stops there, lol[/quote][/i]

Yeah, but my point was AFTER you got off the train and rode the ferry!! Train's not gonna wait for you to ride the ferry and come back!!


Hey Graham.........how about ONE CAR and three or four people?? You could probably go up and come back in a day. You're saving the planet by car-pooling and your saying screw you to the oil companies because you're doing it all in just one vehicle!!

Just a thought.

[Low Light Mike]

Speaking of Powell River, and ferries:

I took the Q-Burnaby this weekend:

- On the first sailing out of Comox on Saturday which I was on, there were maybe 25 vehicles in total. The sailing time was 6:30 am, and they didn't start loading until just 3 minutes before the scheduled sailing time. That drives me nuts.

- On return trip today, the 12:10 sailing out of Westview, the ship was maybe 1/4 full or so. This time, we started loading almost 15 minutes before the scheduled sailing time, and we departed exactly on schedule. The actual sailing time was only 65 minutes.......which is 15 minutes faster than the advertised time.

Because I had the privilege of riding the ferries on my chosen sailing times this weekend, and because the sailings were pretty empty, I want to react against any sense of "coastal entitlement" that I might be tempted to have, and to clearly give thanks to the taxpayers of BC who helped finance the convenience of me being able to sail on a mostly-empty ship. If pure economics were in charge of determining the frequency of the Comox-PR sailings, there might only be 1 per week, at some times of the year. So I don't take for granted the fact that on any day of the year, I can pick from 4 different sailings, just to suit my schedule. Perhaps this is a social comment on society today, where we need expensive, unaffordable infrastructure in place, just to give me some more personal freedom of choice. Back in the Union-Steamship days, people valued the small amount of service that they received, and they fit their lives around the weekly call-ins of the Cheslakee and it's other sisters. Today, in our "I want mine now" society, I felt guilty that I was making all you fellows pay a part of the price for my sailing-convenience.

Thanks for all your hard work, ladies & gentlemen. To those of you working hard at minimum wage, it's good to know that part of the small amount of tax you paid has allowed me to have some convenient sailing times. To those who may have paid some 45% top-marginal-rate tax on some high earnings this year, I also thank you for donating part of your work or good-fortune to the cause of my schedule-convenience. And to the hard workers of BC Ferries on the Comox route, I doubly thank you: both for the actual running of the ship, and for the taxes you pay that help to allow me to use the ship.

It's good to know that the time that you spent working, when you might have rather been fishing or drinking, was instead a help to allow me to sail on the mostly-empty 6:30am sailing out of Comox. Maybe if you worked a bit harder, then you could help to produce more tax revenue to fund the convenience of "Generation-Entitlement".

[Retrovision]

airchime said:

Hey Graham.........how about ONE CAR and three or four people?? You could probably go up and come back in a day. You're saving the planet by car-pooling and your saying screw you to the oil companies because you're doing it all in just one vehicle!!

Just a thought.

It's only really for the awareness that I've put this idea out there in this way; I'm not one to sweat the small stuff, and wouldn't dare let 'them' win by stressing over not being able ditch the car. The majority of North Americans... err, umm, The Oil Companies (Drug dealers, for example, wouldn't exist without the dependance of addicts on their product) get their way when people like myself waste our energy on efforts as frivilous as trying to make one single trip without a car.

...One of my mom's best friends, who works in the industry, who's personal goal in life is to eliminate our dependance on the internal-combustion engine, still owns and drives a car, using a similar philosiphy: She can do so much more when using the system (in this case, her car) to her advantage.

airchime said:

the E&N stops there, lol

Yeah, but my point was AFTER you got off the train and rode the ferry!! Train's not gonna wait for you to ride the ferry and come back!!

Acutally, BC Transit in the Comox Valley extends as far South as Royston, and Union, Buckley and Fanny Bays, as far West as Cumberland, and, as mentioned, to the Little River ferry terminal.

Here's the system map:



And here's the Buckley Bay route:

[Quinsam]

I wouldn't mind Travelling on the Quinitsa, but I live too far away, if I could Persuade dad to drive me up to Nanaimo, I could ride the Quinitsa's Cousin, the Quinsam.
(A ship's Cousin is another ship that is similar in looks, but has a different capacity and size.)
Or I could ride the train from Victoria to Buckley Bay, then ride the Quinitsa, and chat for a while with you guys, then head back to Victoria.

[Neil]

tp HMCS Nanaimo: You're right about the Powell River-Comox route- it's always been under utilized, most days, and I suppose if the crewing arrangements could be made, it would be better quite often to have a couple of round trips a day, instead of four. For the most part, the Queen of Burnaby is wasted on that route.

Well said about the need to appreciate the benefits of living in a civilized society where the state does provide a lot of amenities. I think, though, that more often than not, those services meet a need, and not necessarily a whim.

It might perhaps be idealizing past eras to say that we have an overbearing sense of entitlement that they didn't have. People in the '50s no doubt appreciated Union Steamships or CP service, but that's not to say that they considered it adequate. A number of our modern ferry services came about due to complaining, petitioning and political arm twisting; people demanded better service, and felt they were entitled to it. Everything's relative, and I suppose it depends on your perspective regarding what we should expect in a fairly wealthy society from our government as to whether you think we're overly pampered.

to tsawwassenterminal: you're right about the futility of making token gestures of abstention against the oil industry that do little aside from inconveniencing yourself. Your overall commitment to public transit is more effective. Nationalize the bas---ds, I say. And people should stop patronizing their 'Town Pantry' and 'On the Run' stores. Don't give the thieves one penny for anything except gas. Bad enough we have to do that.

Last time I looked, there were about six buses a day between Nanaimo and Courtenay. Laidlaw, I think it is. So it's perfectly feasible to do bus, ferry and/or train all up the Sunshine Coast, and down the east coast of the Island.

[Low Light Mike]

HornbyGuy: thanks for the discussion and thoughts on my points.

That's why I love this board.......we get some good sharing of viewpoints !