When it comes to canoeing, Canadians can be divided into two groups of people, Johnsonians and Leacockians.

As children, Johnsonians invariably went to summer camp in the woods where they chanted Pauline Johnson's anthem, "The Song My Paddle Sings," around the campfire each night. ("Be strong, O paddle! be brave, canoe!") Later in life they spend their holidays hurtling down one pest-infested waterway after another.

As you may infer, I am a Leacockian. We feel as Stephen...

On a recent visit to Shawnigan Lake on southern Vancouver Island I seized the opportunity to visit the Kinsol Trestle, one of British Columbia's most impressive feats of engineering.

Located just north of Shawnigan, it towers 44.2 metres (145 feet) above the Koksilah River. It is the tallest surviving timber trestle in Canada and the oldest trestle of its kind in the world. Even...

Today is a national holiday across Canada. Depending on where you live it may be Family Day or Simcoe Day or Natal Day or whatever. What matters is, most of us get a day off work.

In BC the holiday is called, predictably, British Columbia Day and often is used as the occasion for gushing displays of provincial pride. (As humorist Eric Nicol once remarked, BC residents like...

Here are some photographs from my recent stay on Savary Island.

For those unlucky enough never to have visited, Savary is a small (less than 8 km from end to end), crescent-shaped island just north of Powell River at the top of BC's Sunshine Coast. Ringed with sandy beaches, Savary offers some of the nicest ocean swimming on the coast.

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Three of my enthusiasms to share this time:

1. basketball. NBA teams, in this case the Toronto Raptors, are using video technology to choreograph their play.

2. Woody Allen. His thirty best one-liners, at least according to the London ...