We were heading for the Cabin. It has been in the family for nearly 90 years and for many of those years it offered an uninsulated seasonal retreat from urban and professional life, without power or utilities.  Despite improvements, it is still called the Cabin, in implicit recognition that it is really the location, not the structure, that is its essence. It remains a place for reflection and thought, for retreat, for inspiration. It has the effect of projecting an observer out, as though on a rocky platform suspended over Auke Bay, beneath a vast dome of sky, into an amphitheater with a nearly 360-degree view, bordered by mountains, rocky shore, an iconic reef, salmon streams, wildlife.

Auke Bay's waters are in constant motion and rearrangement. The sky cycles through the full range of atmospheric humors. Clouds form, gather, threaten, dissipate. The result is constant change, in sky, water, light, emotion.  And that doesn't even take into account the never ending traffic of gulls, crows, ravens, eagles, and smaller birds.

There are corresponding and seemingly constant changes to the building and the land immediately around it, to maintain it, and even improve it.  

A wide view under brilliant sky, a state ferry departs, the mountains in seeming recession, barely above the horizon, the dome overhead vast and expansive: 

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Clouds inevitably form sooner or later, leaving the cabin gray on a gray day, except for some bright patches of white in the gray overcast above the harbor.

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But finally the maple overlooking the reef is a study in muted hues, on an almost-featureless gray cloud canvas.
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Efforts never end, whether moving the rhododendron to a better location or trying to manage surface water.  EF4A9643 EF4A9607

Seemingly immovable, the foundations of the great trees can fail.

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