My northern BC affair is over … I’m leaving Prince Rupert for Victoria.
Sneaking out in the dark of the night, dragging my personal effects to a downtown pick-up point.
Where you pay your money, you take your chances.
This is where the convoluted journey to the airport starts – you’ve got to be committed to flee Prince Rupert.
Someone suggested I make a run for it, yet that would involve swimming over to the island to where the damn runway is.
I end up doing it the correct way, via bus and boat, then joining a queue of equally liable people – a real motley crowd – for a flight south.
In blue skies, buzzing down the arresting coastline and into Vancouver, for a two hour layover plus delays, then back out again for the quick dash to Vancouver Island.
I have a rental waiting to meet me at the airport, so within minutes I’m escaping the scene along a dual carriageway to downtown, a one-way system, parking meters, the sprawling hostel.
Someone has turned the heat up … Victoria is hot.
I regain some kind of composure on the waterfront, blending in with a fresh beer at the brewpub, overlooking the harbour, watching the seaplanes come and go.
Out on the streets, a busy city, a hybrid city; somewhere to merge in relatively easily with my anonymous identity.
Yet I end up on a pink bicycle, downing a lamb burger and a Hoyne pils, while Parquet Courts and the Human League follow me.
I shake them off at Whistling Buoy Brewing, down in the Market Square, which feels almost like a theatre space waiting for a drama.
Outside, impromptu street music strikes up in front of the old shoe shop, early evening crowds gathered.
Around the corner, Bob Ross is grinning at me from a window display … yet the view isn’t anything to write home about.
I go upstairs to a stifling hot room, with a head full of dreams, drama and emotional landscapes.
An Outside World 