On the same trip that I saw all the ranches, we also took a ferry to Victoria. Victoria the city. Prior to going, I had when describing the plan referred to Victoria Island as the ultimate destination, but we actually went to Vancouver...Island. Not to Vancouver the city. For some inexplicable reason human beings seem to be addicted to confusing and overlapping and anarchic geographical terms, so the Canadians gave the island the same name as the city which is not on the island, and gave the city on the island a completely different name. Similarly, here in Utah, we have the largest city in the state, called Salt Lake City, in Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. This is acceptable and easy to remember. But in a few decades the largest city in the county and the state will be West Valley City, an odiously bland and bureaucratic name for a gigantic subdivision of Salt Lake City which is not part of Salt Lake City. What do visitors make of the name West Valley? Why not call it What Valley City? Even North Las Vegas has a better name.
Anyway, we took a ferry to the island. I'd looked forward to this ferry ride as I had many fond memories of taking ferries in Puget sound many years before. But some misgivings prowled at the dimly lit corners of my mind. Although I had not experienced any sea sickness on those previous ferries, they had all been in Puget sound, whereas this ferry to the island would traverse the mouth of the sound, with some possible exposure to oceanic waves, and to the possibility of the motion sickness forever associated in my mind with the open sea, both for myself and the unfortunates to whom I have bequeathed a portion of my DNA.
This possibility was vividly pushed to the forefront of my consciousness by several episodes of car sickness experienced by my older child during our ventures through the Washington Rockies. I purchased Dramamine for the kids, but held back for myself, unwisely. The ferry turned out to have more exposure to the waves than I feared, and my time afloat was haunted by the expectation of nausea (the word itself derives from the same ancient Latin root as the word nautical). But necessity is the mother of invention, and in the absence of pharmaceutical aids I was able to devise a scientifically based system for managing the revolting motion of the ship. I call the technique Visuo-Proprioceptive-Calibration, or VPC. I stayed on the upper deck of the ferry, in the intense cold wind, abandoned by my family (all safely drugged except for my steely nerved wife, who is completely immune to such troubles), and focused my vision on the deck railing and its motion relative to the horizon. This motion aligned exactly with the lurching motion my senses were experiencing with each malignant wave, and gave my stomach a constant reassurance that maintained its contents in a peaceful state. I include visual aids along with my journal entries from the trip:
1515
No waving movement at all. Extremely windy. Ominous whitecaps.
Smoke above the city. A warning?
Mistook a man's spoon for a selfie stick. Felt awful about it. Infant crying.
1530
It has begun. First dip. Mount baker.
Wind worse
1545
Halfway. Two railing dips
1601
Two thirds 1.75 to 0.5 railings, quick. Open ocean to west or right. Port?
1615
Ship slowing down. Still windy. Measured a 3.5 maybe 4 rating wave at time of turn. Going down to survey damage
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