West Bay Walkway Itself

Since it has become my favourite morning walk these days I've been posting a lot of photos taken from the West Bay Walkway. Here are a couple of photos of the West Bay Walkway. The photo above is near the western end of the walkway. Here it crosses a little stretch of shallow water where one can look down into the intertidal zone. To the left you can see the same stretch of the walkway from further east.

Boo

In 2008 and 2009 I posted seasonally appropriate photos for Halloweeen on October 31. This year there were a couple of photos of a fogbank. This is the first year I can remember forgetting that it was Halloween. Later in the day and in the evening of the 31st October, of course I realized it was Halloween, but through most of the day I just thought it was a normal Sunday. While this might be creeping senility, I tend to think it has more to do with the changing nature of the holiday. There used to be more of a sense of catharsis associated with this particular holiday that is now lacking. Every year it becomes more toothless and safe. The fearmongers are winning.

Another ASTK

In early October I posted a photo of a "paste up" by local graffiti artist ASTK. The subject was Ricky of the "Trailer Park Boys" television show. Commenter Ngawangchodron mentioned that she had posted one of Bubbles and Conky by the same artist from the same show. Since then I've been on the lookout for any more of these paste ups by ASTK and so I was happy to see a new one yesterday morning on Wilson Street in Vic West. I think this is Steve Carrell who plays office manager Michael Scott in the American version of the television series, "The Office."

Buffleheads (Bucephala albeola)

The lovely little diving ducks are called Buffleheads (Bucephala albeola). They were swimming and diving quite energetically offshore of the West Bay Walkway when I noticed a large Harbour Seal (right below) approaching them.

The seal dived and a few moments later all the ducks were in flight. Seals are occasionally known to opportunistically attack sea birds and I suspect these little ducks must look as inviting from beneath the surface as they do above. The event was a little reminder that the animals we observe in these peaceful natural scenes probably see their environment quite differently from how we view it.

Wellburn's

Here is a photo of Victoria's heritage supermarket, Wellburn's. It is situated on the edge of downtown on the corner of Cook and Pandora Streets. The building itself is interesting with quite a lot of ornate moldings and cornices but for me there is equal interest in the narrow slice of North American marketing history this store represents. This is neither a corner store nor a modern supermarket but seems to be a transitional stage in the evolution of the modern supermarket. For me this comes from the era when Department Stores had come to the forefront of marketing, before they lost out to the suburban shopping malls. Department stores didn't have much to do with food and stores like Wellburn's were an attempt to use the same everything under one roof technique to sell grocery items. I'm sure the history of marketing is much more complex than my ideas of it, but passing by Wellburn's always makes me think of how things change and how we got where we are. Wikipedia has interesting articles on both supermarkets and department stores and their development.

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I hope any local history buffs out there will tell us more about Wellburn's. I know it's been around for a long time in that building but I don't know much more than that.