Gabriola Island Lifestyle Blog

Every year by December my husband and I are dreaming of blue skies and warm lazy days in an empty desert. Perhaps this is not your definition of paradise but for us it works. We adore the desert and thrive on the quiet and slow pace of life, spending many hours hiking and biking. Some may think that there is nothing in the desert, but that is simply not true. We saw rabbits, coyote, desert squirrels, long horn sheep, lizards, beetles and lots of birds. Even the dryest of deserts have many types of plants and some desert is actually quite lush with palms and small springs.

This year we found that north of the Mexican border only the low desert in California offered the warmth that we so crave without having to drive too far. The coast, the high desert and Arizona were not much warmer than Gabriola Island so we spent 10 weeks exploring Death Valley National Park and the Anza Borrego Desert State Park. Both are quite beautiful, sunny, dry and warm with wonderful hiking, fantastic geology and interesting history, plus with all the rain this year (yes, we had a few wet days) there were lots of wild flowers and the cactus were starting bloom.

We would have loved to stay until spring and seen the desert in full bloom but my partners called me back, “the real estate market on Gabriola is starting to heat up and we need your help!”

So I’m back on Gabriola Island and back to work – now we are dreaming of spring, summer and fall in this paradise.