 |
|
|
NEWS AND EVENTS CALENDAR Fisherman's Resort & Marina Scroll to bottom for Calendar of Events FISHERMAN'S' HISTORY Jo & Peter Benjafield first bought the small live-bait and boat rental business at the entrance to Garden Bay in 1961 and transformed it into a resort and marina. Wally & Sue Nowik continued to build its reputation as a spectacular base for fishing, hiking, boating, SCUBA diving, sunset watching and just plain relaxing. David Pritchard and Jennifer Love took over the property in April 2005, and have been very busy ever since upgrading and improving the facilities, while maintaining the “1960s west-coast village” ambience that continues to attract so many returning customers. IMPROVEMENTS SINCE APRIL 2005 During 2008, a new septic system was installed, servicing most of the marina and resort, and most hydro cables were converted to underground. This delayed the opening of the resort slightly - to mid-May. Apologies for any inconvenience this may have caused. Some major improvements were completed on the docks in 2008. Cabin 1 (Prawn Palace) had a new shower installed. David and Jennifer demolished their house, which was situated just above the upper campground area overlooking the marina, in fall 2006 and are still building the new one. It's taking longer than they expected! During construction, they are living in cabins 3 and 4, so these will not be available for rental until sometime early in 2009. . During 2005 and 2006, the “Oyster Shack” (cabin #2) was enlarged and completely renovated; the other cabins all had new paint jobs; the tackle shop received a new roof and front deck as well as a fresh new look inside; the marina washrooms were improved; there’s a new deck at the top of the ramp to the docks and ongoing dock improvements underway. A new customer computer terminal was set up, so you can purchase a fishing licence online. BroadBandXpress has been installed on the roof of John Henry's next door, so if you are a subscriber you can access the internet on your laptop any time you like.
Above: Tackle shop renovation completed spring 2007
David and Jennifer SUMMER 2007 Bill and Joanne Farmer did return from Nanaimo, to help us with running the marina/resort, but Bill ended up in hospital in early August, with a nasty infection. He is still recuperating and so they won't be returning to Fisherman's in 2008, but he is finally on the mend. Jeff Stickler, who worked at Fisherman's during our first summer here, agreed to come back from Vancouver Island and so saved us from total burn-out! We have two young local women, Janine and Ayla, lined up to work with us for summer 2008.
Sunset at Fisherman's, August 2007 SUMMER 2006 Last summer we hired Bill and Joanne Farmer, from Nanaimo, who lived on their boat in the marina and provided ever cheerful, knowledgable assistance to boaters and resorters alike. They enjoyed it so much they're planning to come back in 2007. May to September was very busy and filled with numerous highlights, such as visits from the 101 ft. HMCS Oriole, a Canadian Navy sail training ship, and also from two US SeaScouts vessels - the 64 ft. Propeller and the 78 ft. Charles N. Curtis.
HMCS Oriole
In May, a group of 14 Grand Banks boats, on a tour celebrating 50 years of GB boatbuilding, stopped in on their way to Alaska. This picture of David and Rosie showed up in the September 2006 issue of Passagemaker magazine. Jazz Festival weekend, in September, was very busy once again - boating groups from Schooner Cove Yacht Club and the Barnett Sailing Co-op, as well as charter boats for Cooper Boating, made sure the docks were hopping.
CALENDAR OF EVENTS - Click on underlined items to link to their websites. APRIL 2008
MAY 2008
JUNE 2008
JULY 2008
AUGUST 2008
SEPTEMBER 2008
|
 |
|
