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The silent, scented forest stretches out in all directions around Mount Elphinstone. Ancient trees tower hundreds of feet above me, and crystal creeks roar through rocky sluices below me down to the Salish Sea. I step over a log that has fallen across the long-abandoned path I’ve been exploring and meander across a carpet of moss that covers the forest floor and shrouds the hulks of fallen giants. Many centuries ago, those hulks had themselves been the rulers of this forest; and even now, after all that time, they are still playing a vital role in its eternal life cycle. In the misty silence, as the trees rise up through the tangled layers of their history, I can sense their ghostly lineage. It is a lineage whose nobility and reality I cannot fathom.
Thank you for checking out my Blog page. The blogs below are my personal reflections on the Elphinstone Forest and other aspects of life here on the Sunshine Coast. I would love to hear your thoughts and ideas on these posts as well as on other related topics. Please use the ‘Contact/Comments’ page on this website to provide your feedback. If there is enough interest, I will continue posting new blogs in the months ahead.
—Robert O’Neill
My latest blogs
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Special initiative to help ELF with trail clearing
Read more: Special initiative to help ELF with trail clearingThe annual maintenance of ELF’s many trails (including the 9-kilometre Health Trail) is an enormous undertaking. Each year we owe a debt of gratitude to the unseen people who do all that work, ensuring that the trails are clear for hiking. The trail clearing work this year is more difficult than in previous years because…
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Forests reflected in a furtive lake
Read more: Forests reflected in a furtive lakeThis is my tribute to Canada’s nature poets, who play an important role in helping us understand and celebrate the uniqueness of our natural world. We all want to see the world as wholistic and organic, and we want to see ourselves as a harmonious part of that wholistic world. We look to our poets…
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Celebrating community in a disconnected world
Read more: Celebrating community in a disconnected worldThe Roberts Creek Cohousing community this month is celebrating its 20th anniversary. In May, 2004, Gary Kent, his wife Stacia, Cindy Sutherland, Joyce Chong and others moved into their new housing complex, which they had spent the previous four years building. The two pictures below show an event held there last month in celebration of…
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A modest proposal – The sequel
Read more: A modest proposal – The sequelMore and more British Columbians are pursuing outdoor recreation activities. Each year on the Sunshine Coast there are more cars than the year before driving over our forest roads.
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Protecting the forest from our own government
Read more: Protecting the forest from our own governmentNearly everyone agrees that our magnificent old forests must be protected. They contain some of the tallest trees on earth, they regulate the planet’s water supply, and they nurture its most diverse ecosystem. Internationally, the protection of North America’s rainforests is seen as the world’s best hope for combatting climate change. In BC, each new…
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The mythology of trees
Read more: The mythology of treesOnce upon a time, many centuries ago, when all our ancestors were forest dwellers, they had an intuitive understanding of their connection to those forests.
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More leaders, more hikes
Read more: More leaders, more hikesMy first blog on this page is an appeal to our experienced hikers to take on partial leadership of some of our hikes. We know that getting out in the forest is important for our health. The best incentive for doing that is having access to hiking groups…
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Lost in the forest
Read more: Lost in the forestThe first time I got lost in the Elphinstone Forest was 22 years ago, shortly after we had decided to move to Roberts Creek. It was a hot summer day, and I headed out to do some exploring. After driving up one of the forest service roads, I turned onto a narrow, deactivated logging road…
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Human society and the forest
Read more: Human society and the forestTo walk through an old forest –one that has not been profaned by human encroachment– is to get the feeling of being in a holy place…