When Oliver Sacks was a young man, after finishing his medical training he decided to move to Canada. On his first trip across the country he met a man he calls “The Professor” who gave this young traveler some advice.

“Travel now by all means – if you have the time. But travel the right way…always reading and thinking of the history and geography of a place. See its people in terms of these, placed in the social framework of time and space.”

A local writer and historian I met recently described this as “feeling the land”, a righteous pastime for those of us with over-active imaginations.

After my first short visit to Quadra Island last solstice (So What Could Possibly Go Wrong), I went back for a day trip with a small group of people on a history tour with Jeanette Taylor, who literally wrote the book on the history of Quadra and the surrounding area. Under her guidance and knowledge, a bunch of scratched rocks on a low tide beach became petroglyphs carved by people thousands of years ago; an old house, restored by its current owner, became the first home built by a first white settler on the island; a quiet bay in the north of the island, now a place of pleasure boats and kayakers became a bustling port and settlement for early logging and mining activity; a clearing deep in the woods became an early gold mine and the Heriot Bay Inn that has been there since the earliest European settlers had many juicy tales to tell, as well as a few ghosts.

The only thing left of the abandoned gold mine are a couple of crumbling structures, now collapsed and covered with moss and brush, the remains of a huge steam donkey and a couple of deep, dark holes in the ground, the mine shafts, now covered with iron grills for safety. The mine still has gold in it but the extraction has been difficult; the mine used to keep flooding, hence the machinery to keep it pumped out. It wasn’t active for long. Peering down the narrow shaft through the grill holes makes my skin crawl – what a way to earn a living. Life must have been rough back then. Many of the men who were traveling to these parts to take advantage of land being offered up for preemption by the government (First Nations’ land – another story) weren’t farmers and had to go off and get whatever work they could find, which was usually in mining and logging – both incredibly dangerous occupations in those days.

We returned once again to Quadra for several days around Labour Day where I’d rented a (different) cottage with killer views over a sheltered bay towards the islands beyond and mainland mountain ranges. Looking directly across at the Rebecca Spit which almost encircled the bay, was a stretch of land, just to the left of a break in the trees, that had a history much older than that of those early European settlers. Here an archeological dig 50 years ago found that this place had been a look out and fort for the First Nations people on this land, used for a period of time until about 450 years ago – pre contact – during times of war with other tribes, a time when people were afraid. The archaelogists found the postholes and remnants of 3 buildings, the palisade enclosure and surrounding trenches. I can see the gap where the trench cutting off the north end of the spit was.

I went over to check it out. Of course now, many years after the dig, and many many more since it was in use, there is nothing left to see. A patch of land, a ridge, a wide view of the strait and a big juvenile bald eagle now hanging out in a tree above – still a lookout place for someone. I walked the site and the rocky beach in front of it, trying to figure out what it was about that place that had made it an ideal look out and imagining what it was like to live there then, under threat from these waters. Open views to the south, views to the islands to the north, wide open to the storms that toss tree trunks up on the beach like toothpicks. The trees that are now on the land have grown up since then and even the spit itself is not the same. The 7.3 earthquake that hit central Vancouver Island in 1946 crumbled the end of it back into the depths.

Today Rebecca Spit is a provincial park enjoyed by many, and the protected bay is a popular anchor for the summer pleasure boats around these beautiful islands. It’s a gorgeous, protected spot beside adjacent protected Heriot Bay – no doubt a desirable place for whoever that old lookout post was protecting, as it still is today.

Nothing left to “see”, lots to “feel”.

After days of hiking, exploring and view dreaming, by this third visit of the season I had become so infatuated with Quadra Island, I announced that I wanted a summer cottage there and planned to buy one when I win the lottery. Hmmm. Better check my lottery ticket. I looked up the winning numbers and compared. First number, check – got it, second, check – got that one too, third, check (this was getting weird), fourth, check, fifth check – sixth, close but no cigar. I had 5 of 7 numbers. Would you like to know what the difference is between 5 winning numbers and 7 winning numbers? $54,999,895. I won $105.

Ephemera: On that first cross-country trip to Canada, the young Oliver Sacks spent a summer here in Qualicum Beach. He never did settle in Canada in the end. A subsequent trip to San Francisco captured his heart and he moved to the U.S. instead where he went on to become a neurologist and writer (Awakenings, The Man Who Mistook His Wife For a Hat). He continued to follow The Professor’s advice in a lifetime of travels.

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