6 April 2026 – And also look straight ahead.
I’m in Rocky Point Park in Port Moody, headed for the Shoreline Trail that curves around the far eastern end of Burrard Inlet. It’s in forest — but right on the edge of the forest, with constant water views. For example, the mud flats I’ve just shown you — all the more dramatic with the one-two punch of low tide and bright sunshine.
All along the way, ribbons of water snake through the mud, every instant their positions that tiny bit different, true to nature’s rhythms.
The pedestrian trail, separate from the biking trail, is gravel, liberally supplied with benches, and sometimes, as here, quite broad.
But sometimes not broad — as here, with a liberal supply of tree roots.
When I’m not watching where I put my feet — an important part of “look low” — I’m giddy-stunned by the interplay of colour and texture. All around me, every level. This stump, for example, itself firm and crisply defined…
but in a context of other colours, other textures.
Reds so red!
Greens so green!
And textures smack up against each other, to punch colour & energy that much higher.
Signs of early spring.
My first Skunk Cabbage of the year…
and, up in those trees, not only nests that show this is indeed a Great Blue Heron Nesting Colony…
but adult heron heads poking out of almost every nest, and this heron (to right of the left-hand nest) perched on a branch.
I don’t know whose duties are what, up there in the nests. Like other trail-walkers, I’m content just to watch for a while, and admire.
Thanks to low tide, it’s an easy walk out to the lumber mill remnants still to be seen in Old Mill Site Park.
I look out-across to the big view, but I also look down-under a decaying concrete ledge, itself now covered in moss and colonizing plants…
to see some of the industrial decay: rotting supports, shards of brick and, but of course, yer basic bit of 21st-c. graffiti.
I’m not quite at Trail’s end, not quite all the way to Old Orchard Park, but this is always the spot I feel marks my personal trail’s end. (And, hey, it’s my walk, right?) So I turn.
One last pause to admire the snake dance of mud & water…
one last pause to admire dappled shadows thrown on trees & trail…
and I’m back in Port Moody.
Where a random walk down Clarke Street leads me first past — and then very much into — Andes Latin Foods. Run by a family from Venezuela, the bodega offers foodstuffs from all the Andean countries, both staples to take away, and foods to eat then and there from the menu.
I settle into place.
The café con leche is trans-Andean, but the alfajor is definitely the Peruvian version.
Bliss!
WALKING WOMAN 