Overnighted in Chemainus. Need a leisurely day. Still feel the motion of the boat in my head from yesterday's whale watching excursion, and my face is sunburned and windburned. I'm starting to look like badly tanned leather or maybe beef jerky. This day I will saturate myself in outdoor totems, viewed at a leisurely pace in the city of Duncan and at the Quw'utsun' Cultural Centre. Duncan seems to be a slightly uneasy mix of Europeans (picked up on several accents - German, British, Scot) who are the town oldsters and Cowichan First Nations folks who constitute the under 40 portion of the population. That's a broad generalization, but I bet you'd make the same observation. A Cowichan Reserve abuts downtown Duncan. In the 1980's, Duncan's mayor began commissioning First Nations artists to carve new totems. Over 80 were carved and placed around the city. They just pop up everywhere. I'm not sure about the mayor's motivation - to bring in tourists or to beautify the city or to encourage the flagging carving tradition - but I'm glad for whatever it was. I found the local museum in a restored train depot and nosed around there (it's very good for a very small museum) until the 1:00pm walking totem tour began. Ron, the totem pole tour guide (pic 1), was a great guide. He had a lot of knowledge about totem symbology and the various artists who created the poles. He has spent time with many of the carvers and had first hand knowledge about what they were going for in their work. The more I see totems, read about them, and listen to people like Ron, the more I realize that, while a symbol may appear over and over and typically have the same basic meaning in each example, there are endless subtle differences and nuances that enhance the story that the totem tells - not all totems tell a story but the majority that I have seen do. I did not see all 80+ totems - the tour sticks to the downtown core - but a majority and they were marvelous. Second pic is of a totem who's girth is the largest in the world - impressive. Carved on the spot (took over a year) and lifted into place with a crane. Several more Duncan totem photos included. Can you find the totem that seems out of character? It was done by a Maori carver from New Zealand in a carving exchange program. After the tour I drove to the Quw'utsun' Cultural Centre on the edge of town to learn about the Cowichan First Nation and see the totem poles exhibited there. The Centre sits beside the crystal clear Cowichan River (8th photo) and the complex is a little slice of heaven. A young Cowichan man served as our tour guide (9th photo). He was a masterful story teller. He interpreted the elements of the totems then told traditional Cowichan legends that included characters from the totems. Interesting to note that the Cowichan (like many cultures) have a flood legend in which the Earth is completely inundated and only a few people survive to repopulate. They also have a story about a wild woman who captures children, takes them to her house, and cooks them for dinner - almost exactly like the gruesome Hansel and Gretel bedtime story my mother read to me as a child (which is likely why I'm warped). The likeness of the wild woman is carved into a totem and shown in the pic after the river shot. Few more totem shots included. The tour included a film called The Great Deeds which relates Cowichan history and legends. On the way to Nanaimo for the night I pulled into a tiny little provincial park just off Canada 1 called Petroglyph Park. The park protects several aboriginal petroglyphs (images pecked into stone). Of particular interest to me since I have training in recording aboriginal rock art and have recorded in the Texas Trans-Pecos region. Quite different here. Petroglyphs in the Trans-Pecos are often pecked into boulders. Here the glyphs are in soft sandstone slabs laying flat on the surface. Two photos included; however, it's hard to see the glyphs in photos as they are quite weathered and the light was fading - and then there's my lack of camera skills. Tomorrow I head for the west coast of the island (Tofino) to see the rainforest and do some camping and hiking. Likely I won't have internet, so I'll "see" you in a few days.
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