Cowichan Shipyard
Yesterday we had a trip to Cowichan Bay located about an hour north of Victoria. It is a very small village comprised mostly of touristy funky stores and eateries, but also is home to marinas and wharfs, house boats and a small, cramped shipyard. This little community is centred on the waterfront, with a cliff on the landward side of the road many of the structures are built out over the water, with their backs against the sidewalk. Other parts of the community are scattered in nearby farmland a bit inland.
We had gone to Cowichan Bay to have a late lunch with Mr. and Mrs. Toad, of the Toadhollowphoto blog and afterwards, between showers, we walked around a bit, including out onto the docks. A very pleasant afternoon indeed. We passed the Cowichan Shipyard which clearly dates to a time when the average boat in the fishing fleet was a lot smaller than they are now, as exemplified by the Royal Hunter that might have as much as six inches to spare on either side. Must be tricky to position these vessels on the ways exactly correctly that they can be pulled up into this slot without pulling the roofs off adjacent parts of the shipyard.
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To open the gallery for a larger view of the images below click on any of the thumbnails, navigate with the arrows and escape to return to this page.
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Canon 5Dii, Canon 50mm/f1.4 and Nikkor-N pre-ai 24mm/f2.8 lenses, ISO125, f-1.6 for shots with 50mm lens, f-2.8 for those with 24mm lens. All are HDR processed from 3 brackets , +/- 1.0 EV.
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burnt embers 
I’ve been anxiously looking forward to having a chance to pop by and get caught up, and I can see this was well founded! You’ve done a fabulous job of sharing this wonderful place with everyone here, Ehpem. LOVE your photographs, they really exhibit all the character that we saw in person! We had such a great time hopping around with you, we’re really looking forward to our next adventure together!
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Thank you Toad. It *was* a lot of fun! You chose the perfect spot for lunch and a stroll with cameras.
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I like all the angles in that vertical image; they play against the lines in the boat and the sky also.
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Thanks Karen. It was pretty compelling scene with that large boat shoved into a small crack, and all the red and yellow and ribbed metal.
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I like some of the angles you have come up with for photographing this beautiful building. The building has seen Cowichan Bay’s early history, and still plays an active part in Cowichan Bay today.
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Thank you Joseph. I think I am in your backyard here, or near to it, so its reassuring to get a vote of confidence.
I was thinking one or two of these shots would work well in black and white – lots of converging triangles.
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They are, all of them, very beautiful color images, but I am certain that a number of them could have good black and white renditions. For a start there is the first Photograph. For a black and white I see it cropped a touch tighter with tonal values for roof and walls coming across like the colors of the original. Voila and in all seriousness: an art print.
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That is the one I had my eye on, with a bit of a crop at the bottom and on the left to get the triangles working a bit better. I will give it a try in the next few days.
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Thanks, for the link. I have been photographing the Cowichan Bay Shipyard on a fairly regular basis, usually once a year, inside and out ( mostly inside) for the past 10 years or so, it’s really a special place.
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Hi Gary – thanks for dropping by and commenting. I only had 5 minutes or so on the pavement outside the shipyard, but am dying to go back sometime. It really is a special place. Do you know if the old machinery like the band saw and winch for pulling boats up the ramp are still there and in operation? It looks like a fascinating place.
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I like the predominate blue/red color theme but I wonder how they docked that boat!
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It is hard to imagine. The boat will be on a cradle that is on a small rail line up out of the water. But they would have to set it into the cradle perfectly. There is an ancient piece of machinery that pulls it up the way. You can see the ways in this blog (Gary Nylander Photo) I found after posting my shots, and the machinery in this photo here.
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