Local Expert
W. Ruth Kozak
Ruth is a historical fiction writer and travel journalist who has lived in Vancouver, British Columbia, on the West Coast of Canada most of her life. She has traveled to many places…
Ruth is a historical fiction writer and travel journalist who has lived in Vancouver, British Columbia, on the West Coast of Canada most of her life. She has traveled to many places including Mexico, Central America, South America, Europe, Morocco and Malaysia and made her home in Greece for several years. Where ever she has been, she still considers her home, Vancouver B.C., one of the most beautiful cities in the world.
Ruth teaches writing classes including novel and travel writing for the Vancouver School Board; she also instructs Memoir classes and is the editor/publisher of a travel website Travel Thru History
www.travelthruhistory.com
where she mentors new travel writers and receives contributions from all over the world. She is a member of the B.C. Association of Travel Writers and the Federation of B.C. Writers. Besides publications in many newspapers and on-line 'zines, Ruth wrote the "Trips & Tours" for the 1993 edition of the APA Insight Guide: Vancouver and Surroundings. She looks forward to sharing the beautiful sights and exciting events of her city with Planet Eye readers.
Born with a gypsy soul, Ruth is happiest when on the road going somewhere. "The great affair is to move."
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LOST LAGOON & SIWASH ROCK, MUSE OF POETS
Stanley Park has always been memorialised in the works of poets and painters.
When the famous B.C. painter Emily Carr came to Vancouver in 1906 to teach art she often went to Stanley Park to sketch. She frequently took her students to the park and they would sit under the tall cedars in a grove known as “The Seven Sisters”. She wrote:
“The appalling solemnity, majesty and silence was the holiest thing I ever felt.”
You can see collections of Emily Carr’s watercolours of this forest glade at the Vancouver Art Gallery.
Another person who loved the park was Pauline Johnson, a Mohawk princess from a Six Nations Reserve in Upper Canada. She was the daughter of a Mohawk chief and an English woman and called herself Tekahionwake. By the time she was 12 she had read all of Scott and Byron. In her 20’s she crossed Canada nineteen times reading her poetry. Eventually she made her home in Vancouver. She loved Stanley Park and wrote poems about some of the sites including Siwash Rock “where the twining roadway branches in two”. This famous rock was a reminder to the Squamish people of one of their legends -- a monument to Skalash, a warrior who was turned to stone by Q’uas the Transformer as a reward for his unselfishness.
Lost Lagoon was another favourite place where Pauline Johnson loved to paddle her canoe. She named this tidal pool “Lost Lagoon” and she wrote “O! lure of the lost Lagoon/ I dream tonight my paddle blurs/ The purple shade when the seaweed stirs/ I hear the call of the singing firs/ In the hush of the golden moon.”
Pauline Johnson died in Vancouver, age 53, on March 7, 1913. There is a memorial cairn in a cedar grove at Prospect Point where water flows from the rocks into a small hollow pool at it’s base. Her ashes and two of her books Legends of Vancouver and Flint and Feather are buried near Siwash Rock.
Along the quiet paths that skirt the lagoon you’ll see a variety of wild life including turtles, swans, ducks and long legged herons. Occasionally bold masked racoons will come out of hiding looking for handouts. But be careful, these masked rascals can be vicious. Sit on a bench for awhile and the squirrels will come begging for nuts or seeds. There are locals who make it a daily practice to bring food for the wildlife, but make sure it’s appropriate (no bread!). Seeds and grains can be purchased at the concession stands.