The Drive

This Commercial Drive mural by Ben T. Senetchko shows people enjoying the variety of activities one observes all the time on this funky street.

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Vivid and mouth-watering

Is this gorgeous or what? Love the colors, love the location. It makes me want to get out there and buy potatoes and green onions, for crying out loud!

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Native style

This mural is drawn in the style of Native art. Too bad it's tucked away in a back lane and easy to miss.

Oriental symbols

This dream-inspired mural (on Commercial Drive in Vancouver) is no doubt loaded with significance given the tiger, panda, lion and the palm trees that look a lot like Chinese characters.

Here it is, first stitched together with close-ups below.

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Bold and colorful

I've taken a bit of a break from the mural blog, but am ready to dive in again. This summer hasn't been as good for mural sightings as some others. But I have managed to gather a few goodies.

In the days ahead, I'll be posting my latest finds - mural photos collected along Commercial Drive in Vancouver. (Sorry, no street coordinates, but they were all sighted along Commercial Drive between East 1st Avenue and Venables.)

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Take a look at this beauty, painted on the side of a produce market. The rich colors and energetic figures make you want to move those piles of flats and boxes to get a better look!

(If anyone has more information about this or any mural you find posted here, please let me know and I'll gladly update with titles, artist names etc.)

New murals added Mondays and Thursdays.

Playground whimsy

Nothing deep here - just a couple of playground murals. The first sunflowery one is in Douglas Park in Langley. We pass it on our walk almost every day.

The beach scene is found in Riverfront Park in Kamloops. Doesn't it make you want to just grab a bucket and a shovel and start digging?

Forest fire memories

This mural along Highway 97 between Westbank (now West Kelowna) and Kelowna is a sobering reminder of the devastating Okanagan Mountain Fire of 2003. It shows the burning of the Kettle Valley Railway trestles. Twelve wooden and two steel trestles were destroyed in the fire, but they have since been restored by the Myra Canyon Restoration Society.

Logging memories

A magical dragon scene used to decorate the side of this building on the White Rock Promenade. But in August 2008 it was replaced with this scene from B.C.s logging history. (Gorgeous painting - it should be in a gallery!)

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Orca on display

This decorative orca lives at the Victoria ferry terminal (Tsawwassan departure). It's part of the "Orcas In the City" project which raised over $400,000 for charity in 2004. It's beautiful from every angle.

Totem Town

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This Victoria mural depicts a scene from the past, when aboriginal communities ringed the coast and elaborately carved canoes were the main mode of marine transportation. The settlement in this mural reminds me of what you'd have found in the northern interior of BC, say around Hazelton.

Fish Beware!

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I love the shocked look in the eyes of these fishies in this stylish back alley mural (Victoria BC). I wonder if it has anything to do with the business next door. Worse yet, maybe they watched the videos!

Critters and Sir Hornswoggle

This is some of the company you'll have as you explore the Port Alberni waterfront. (In fact, when I first encountered Sir Hornswoggle on the pier, I was sure he was fellow sighseer.)

Alberni - nautical

This mural, also in Port Alberni, commemorates a sea disaster. On Monday, January 22, 1906, the coastal passenger liner SS Valencia, en route from San Francisco to Seattle, was wrecked on the southwest coast of Vancouver Island (near Bamfield) and 136 people perished.

Gray's Whales mural

In Port Alberni we saw a mural with another kind of whale. This mural of Gray's Whales was painted by Jeff King.

Parksville killer whales

But killer whales aren't popular only on northern Vancouver Island. These are swimming around Parksville

Port Hardy killer whales - 4

These beauties were swimming amongst the flower hangers at the front of the grocery store

Port Hardy killer whales - 3

Here's another chubby black-and-white cutie. (They do look cute, don't they - water pandas!)

Port Hardy killer whales - 2

I love the interesting effect of the killer whale mural painted on the truck trailer displayed against the ocean in the background - somewhat surrealistic.

Port Hardy killer whales - 1

A favorite north Vancouver Island subject of murals is the killer whale. In Port Hardy, we saw them everywhere.

Here is one painted on the school.



(Notice the muralist Razmpoosh - who also painted these Agassiz murals.)

Ink Island

What a colorful, surreal place. (Notice the red bird on left side of the building.)