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Blogs

Mise Tales Forty-Seven

For an update on what a Mise Tale is then please see Mise Tales One. As mentioned earlier on the front page of my website, any photos or cartoons, or short bits of information, when it is removed from the front page, will also be included again later in the next next Misc Tales posting. That way you can keep track […]

What Happens If You Break It?

Classic Fresnel Lighthouse Lenses   (Youtube) Another benefit of Facebook (FB), if you subscribe to the right channels, is the notification of new webpages. In this case a friend on Sentinelles des Mer (FB) led me to their webpage in Belgium www.sentinelles-des-mers.be again in French in case you clicked on the first link already. What a beautiful […]

Refuelling a Lighthouse

British Columbia (BC) lighthouses mostly have diesel generators unless they are close enough to a large town or city to allow a power cable to run to them. So how does one refuel a lighthouse as most of them are sitting fairly high above the water line and very distant from a local gas station? Well, thanks to […]

Mise Tales Forty-Five

For an update on what a Mise Tale is then please see Mise Tales One. As mentioned earlier on the front page of my website, any photos or cartoons, or short bits of information, when it is removed from the front page, will also be included again later in the next next Misc Tales posting. That way you can keep track […]

Lighthouses Attract Birds!

It sounds impossible, but the very bright light emanating from a lighthouse at night attracts  birds. This happens on the most remote of lighthouses, some far out at sea. What interest would birds have in a lighthouse? Well sometimes it is because the light beacon attracts numerous insects which the birds feed upon. In other […]

Trial Island Lighthouse

A lot of people who visit Victoria, British Columbia (on the southern tip of Vancouver Island) never get to see Trial Island lighthouse as it is not visible from the town core. One must travel to the Oak Bay waterfront to see the lighthouse.   Although it is only about half a mile from Oak […]

A Lighthouse For Aircraft

What a beautiful lens! What a unique story. On Facebook the United States Lighthouse Society page shared a photo of the Brittany (Bretagne), France St. Mathieu lighthouse lens. It was borrowed from the  Bretagne Phare St-Mathieu Facebook page. In French the page says: La saison démarre bien, j’ai déjà accueillit beaucoup de monde. Et qui dit nouvelle saison , […]

Light at the End of the World

Light at the End of the World Three Months on Cape St. James, 1941 by Hallvard Dahlie (orig from Raincoast 18, 1998) with notes from Jim Derham-Reid (last keeper on Cape St. James before automation) A strange interlude in my brief seafaring life took place in the fall of 1941, when I signed on as […]

Once Upon a Foggy Night . . .

Imagine you are a lighthouse keeper on the graveyard shift on a foggy night. All you hear are the diesel engines running, the foghorn blowing at intervals. As you stare out into the gloomy mist you hear this sound. It is a boat, but what kind of boat? What kind of motor? Many old-timers will recognize […]

Learning From Nature – Improving LEDs

This is NOT a religious rant so please bear with me. Two Jehovah’s Witnesses dropped by the other day and left after a short time, leaving me with copies of their two publications – Awake! and The Watchtower. As I deposited them on the kitchen table I noticed on the back page of the February […]