The End of Garage Sailing Season

Today, after checking the paper for garage sale ads and noticing so little out there, we have not gone out garage sailing. We’ve decided what is there is so far apart that it would waste gas, so it looks like last week was our last outing. And last week we went all over and spent a dollar, just a dollar. Got 5 CDs but found nothing else we could really use.

So today as a little wrap up, I thought I’d show the sights, the fun stuff, we’ve enjoyed along the way to sales. Because part of the fun of cruising around looking for garage sales is the stuff you run into along the way.

This is something we spied, drove past and backed up again to see it. OK we’re old hippies and here was this van, that just expressed those days. It was flower painted, a VW van known as Hippie haulers in those days, but the bumper had such a fun message. Had to get a photo.

Our flash-backs are all natural

Then one morning we came across this veggie garden out in the street, on the boulevard, in the front yard. Something that’s becoming a trend is growing your own food and getting rid of front lawns. Whoever grew this certainly had green thumbs. Everything was just totally and abundantly sprawling almost over the curb!

Potatoes and squash sprawling over the curb

front yard veggie abundance

Now, we’ve always had a thing about Jaguars, the cars that is, especially the one that Morse drove in the Inspector Morse Mysteries. There is just something about a Jag, the old ones especially.

Look at all those curves

They have a beautiful design to them, lots of curves, and to us, they just suit having people in them. That’s something to notice, whether a car actually looks good with a human in it. So many new cars don’t, people look proportionately wrong or squashed or maybe the car looks so aerodynamic that you only notice that. Anyway, we came across the Jag Show in Oak Bay one afternoon.

Not quite

We tried to make our little Subaru look like a Jag one morning this summer but these were the real thing.

Just dreaming

That’s Bill with his choice. I guess, as artists, we are just attracted to this car that is itself a work of art, right down to the hood ornament.

Sculpted right down to the hood ornament

All summer we’ve tried to take in Jazz in the Park. Often during intermission we wander around Beacon Hill Park taking in the sights. Now what is it about a duck with it’s bottom pointing up as it looks for food underwater that I just can’t resist taking a photo?

Upturned duck

And this photo, of the trees, just behind the bandshell, brought to mind Emily Carr, an eccentric, now finally famous, local artist and writer.

Emily's trees

If you’ve never heard of her, you must look her up. She’s been an inspiration to me most of my life. I love all of her work but the trees she painted are my favourites. Just looking at these trees you can see how she felt moved to capture the flow, the strength and beauty of these coastal trees.

So that’s it, a hodge podge of our little travels. The garage sailing season is over and that time will now be spent on other things, like work in the studio on mosaics or work on sculpture. Or maybe finishing up projects started and forgotten over the summer. An end to one season and the start of another.

Tags: Beacon Hill Park, coastal trees, Emily Carr, flash backs, front yard veggie garden, Garage Sailing, green thumbs, hippie haulers, Inspector Morse, inspiration, Jaguar, Jaguar hood ornament, Oak Bay