The BC Adventure 7

November 10, 1920

Dear Mums and Daddy,

This next weekend we are moving. It took longer than we had planned with all the paperwork that the bank requires and what not with references, etc. but we now have it all in hand.

Our address will be Major and Mrs M S Days at Vesuvius, Salt Spring Island, BC. We will have to go into the main town Ganges to get our mail from the post office there. And that is where we will buy our main grocery items etc. We no doubt will go over to Victoria frequently when we want new clothes or other special items. You can't be in a hurry in a place like this where the main transport depends on the tides and the weather.

Dick and Una feel somewhat upset to be leaving, as they have put a lot of effort into their time here, but Mark and I have not really put down roots, so we are anxious to be able to do that once we get settled in the new place. He has made several contacts with people from Salt Spring who he might convince to join with him at the Cariboo.

We will be staying at the Vesuvius Boarding House, which also includes the only general store in our village. The owners are the Bittancourt Family, who originally came from Portugal. We met Reid and Emma Bittancourt when we were over visiting last time.   The father, who died a few years ago, was called Estalon and he made his vast fortune from quarrying and coal mining. Apparently the piers in Victoria harbour where we arrived last May were stones from Salt Spring that he had quarried and shipped there. The rock is called Vesuvius sandstone. Their family also were very involved in building and running the ferries in the early days.

I have enclosed a snap we took on our last trip here, showing what Vesuvius bay looks like, and you can see the boarding house above the wharf.

I will write again soon to tell you how we are getting on.

Tell Dorothy to write to me.

Love,

Gwenllian