Week 46: Seagull in 1983

This is Seagull cabin in 1983, one of the original Taylor Bay Lodge buildings. We still use it today, though it has been considerably modified. Story has it that the novelist Malcolm Lowry stayed here, though according to Phyllis Reeves’ fascinating and well-documented article in SHALE (2008), Lowry and his wife Margerie actually stayed at what is now the Surf Lodge on Berry Point.

Lowry’s best known book is Under the Volcano (1947), which is widely accepted as one of the great novels of the 20th century; he also wrote October Ferry to Gabriola (edited by Margerie and published posthumously in 1970).

According to Wikipedia: “October Ferry to Gabriola is an existential love story featuring a Lowry-like character, Ethan Lleweyllen, and his wife, in their never-fully-consummated journey to Gabriola … The themes are living, loving, drinking, travel mysticism, and literature in the 1940s.”

Even without the Lowry-Seagull connection, we imagine that many people coming to The Haven over the years (including its founders) might have echoed these words from one of the characters in October Ferry to Gabriola:

“Gabriola! Ah, if it should prove the right place … the dreamed-of place …”