to my homeland...

So the other day a friend of mine was shocked to learn that I haven't swam in the ocean in over two years. And in the past three years, I have only swam in the ocean once. This got us thinking about how much we take for granted where we live.

So many people have never even seen, let alone swam, in the ocean. And here I am, living a minute away from it.

I'm sure we all fall prey to this. We just associate our home town with being that - our home town. I've always made fun of the way that Sechelt's population doubles in the summer in order to provide endless entertainment playing "spot the tourist" but I guess in the 20 years I have lived here, I never considered WHY people were coming here.

Ok, I'll admit it. The Sunshine Coast is freakin' beautiful. People come here because of the scenary and the chillaxin' atmosphere. While I leave the Coast for vacation, others come here to enjoy that which I consider normal.

Strange that it took me that long to figure it all out.

To illustrate my point - here is a photo taken from the balcony of my house. This is exactly what I'm looking at while I'm writing this post. Pretty sweet, eh?



Walk two minutes down the road at twilight - and this is what you'll see:



It's the stuff they use for calendars and sample photos on computers.