May 1st we left Saanichton at 6 a.m. and drove the 2 hours to Qualicum Beach and our new home for at least a year.
The house is a 1970’s built carriage house. The main house to which it belonged sits behind us, but with a fence and trees between there is good privacy. It has 3 bedrooms (although one is more of a den and will be our office space), 1.5 baths and sits on a crawlspace as do most of the homes on the island. The layout is a little quirky with the living area and 2 bedrooms down – the master bed and a large open kitchen/dining/sitting area up. The walls upstairs are slanted on sides so it will be a bit challenging to decorate. With large windows on all sides and 3 skylights there is tons of light and air flow. The garage will be great for extra storage and the back deck has just been re-done and runs the length of the house providing a great outdoor space. The driveway is long and wide allowing us to park our trailer which is a bonus and also made for easier unloading.
We can just see the ocean peeking through the trees from a couple of windows and it is a short 2 minute walk to the water. Surrounding us is a golf course called Eaglecrest – the cart path runs beside our house leading to the 10th hole.
Our belongings from the mainland were delivered a week ago and now a week later we are finally unpacked and organized. In Ottawa we left behind our older, heavy pieces of furniture to avoid the hefty moving costs. Upon moving in, we had purchased a couple beds from a furniture store called Dodds and mattresses online. These were thankfully delivered within a couple days, but we are still waiting on our new living room and dining furniture from Sagers in Victoria, so have been eating our meals at the breakfast bar and watching TV from our bed (hmm, cant’t complain about that…).