Tag Archives: British Columbia

THE PSYCHO-BATES MOTEL ON VANCOUVER ISLAND

Vancouver Island, British Columbia, on Canada’s West Coast is one of the world’s most popular tourist spots—especially those seeking comfort and luxury with unspoiled natural beauty. There’s no shortage of accommodations on “The Island”. That includes options for wealthy and not-so-rich. Most places you find are clean, safe and secure with nothing to worry about. Then, there’s the Psycho-Bates Motel I found on Vancouver Island.

Like, you can’t make this shit up. I’ve lived in Nanaimo on central Vancouver Island for thirty years. I rarely leave because why go out for burgers when you have steak at home. But, sometimes you need to get out of Dodge. So I decided to do the tourist-in-your-own-backyard and surfed the net to plan a road trip on Van Isle.

Tofino and Ucluelet (You-Clue-Lit) are the epitome of Vancouver Island attractions. They’re small sister villages on the extreme west edge of “The Island” about three hours by a windy mountain road from Nanaimo. That grueling drive doesn’t stop folks because the Pacific Rim National Park where Ucluelet (Ukie) and Tofino sit gets about 1 million visits each year. They’re like the Cape Cod and Nantucket of Canada.

It’s shoulder season for Pacific Rim tourism in the spring. That means low room rates. Christmas and New Years with spectacular storm watching bring premium prices. Mid-summer is also crazy expensive with no-vacancies, traffic jams and crowded surf-swept sand beaches. However, mid-April promises great deals as hospitality people hustle for business.

I’ve been over to Tofino and Ukie lots of times. There’s no “must-stay” because new places constantly crop up or old ones change hands. Probably like you, price is always an issue with this guy. Prudently, I went online to look for seasonal deals. But, I wasn’t looking to totally cheap-out, flaunt danger or put my life in serious peril. Here’s what I initially found for lodging before the Psycho-Bates Motel showed up:

Wikininnish Inn — “The Wick” rates as one of Canada’s Top-10 luxury resorts. I went there for New Years dinner once and it nearly broke me. Dinner for 5 was 500 bucks and that didn’t include the cheapest bottle of wine @ $100. Off-season room rates start at $399 per night for no view. It climbs fast if you want a look at the water. No, this was not happening.

Long Beach Lodge Resort — Now, this place is gorgeous. It’s West Coast Craftsman architecture with big timber frames, Douglas Fir trim and blue slate everywhere. The “LBR” is right on a massive sand beach where you see whales from your bed. You have to call for pricing. Nope, not staying there either.
Cox Bay Beach Resort — Another magnificent lodge. I’ve dropped in here too, just to check it out. If I ever win the big one, this is the first stop. Singles start at $225 off-season, but you have to read the fine print. Electricity, running water, locks and wi-fi are a-la-carte. Pass.

Tin-Wis — Now this is a Best Western on Chesterman’s Beach. It’s run by the local native band and I remember my mother sitting on the deck with her “sun-downer” watching the sun go down over the wide open Pacific. Nostalgia apart, the $199 price ain’t there.
Black Rock Oceanfront Resort — This is Ucluelet’s flagship threatening The Wick. It’s cheese-to-chalk in terrain and equally scenic. Where the Wick’s on flat sand, the Rock’s where the name says. I prefer Ukie to Tofino, but @ $250+ I can’t afford staying at the Rock.

Waters Edge Shoreside Suites — This place is interesting and it’s starting to get in the affordable range. They want $183 per night for a room with a view. Non-views are $145. On the safety side, they have complimentary Tsunami warnings as Pacific Rim National Park is part of the Rim-of-Fire where a devastating earthquake and tidal wave is long overdue. Moving on…
Pacific Rim Motel — Hesitantly, I clicked here. Hmmm… this is a really nice facility in my class. Clean. Great location. Simple amenities. And an attractive daily rate of $99. No strings attached. Sadly, it was full. No wonder why.

I figured there must be more shoulder season deals so I kept Googling. I found a few in my under $100 budget. Then… I clicked on the Psycho-Bates Motel.

I’d spent about two hours surfing lodgings. I went to Trivago, Expedia and Craigslist. Something I noticed was most had attractive photos and interactive websites. Most were also on the upsell. The Psycho-Bates Motel was an exception.

My first red flag was their Expedia cover shot. Instead of the gourmet Dungeness crab at the Wick, fabulous fir timbers at the LBR and lovely flower baskets at Cox Bay, I clicked on a bathtub image. Not any ordinary bathtub. No, this one highlighted a stopper with a rusty chain, chipped porcelain and some nasty black mold. All for only 85 bucks a night.

I back-clicked and refreshed. Surely, they couldn’t use this pic as their click-bait? No, the other images were even weirder. A stove with spaghetti-stains. A backsplash with more mold. Something red on the shower curtain. And the toilet? I simply can’t describe it.

I found one photo that really summed it up. No doubt the placed was dated with the colors, the huge tube TV and the phone with a cord. There was a bowl of pet food on the floor and crap on the bed. The metal chair was like something we used in the interrogation room. And when you looked closely at the TV screen, it appeared some porn show was playing.

Being an old cop, coroner and crime writer, this place got my interest. A lot of serious stuff goes down in motel rooms. I had one murder case where 5 people were shot in a motel room. It looked like an abattoir. I’ve had lots of suicides and drug overdoses in motel rooms. They can be messy. Also, tons of tricks get turned in seedy motels that rent by the hour so you never know what’s laying between the sheets. But I never found an online place like the Psycho-Bates Motel. I expected it being managed by a man with a knife. Instead, this motel is run by a woman. A crazy drunk woman.

Sometimes your best accommodation advice can be online reviews. I had to see what others said about their experience here. Trip Adviser for the Psycho-Bates Motel was a gold mine. Like I said, you can’t make this shit up. These are actual quotes of what surviving guests posted.

The place creeped me out. I thought I was becoming sick just from being there. It stank, felt uncomfortable, and the lady at the reception was very rude. I know she was drunk. Would never stay there again or recommend anyone going there. I can deal with a lot, have no high expectations, but the hostel on Seymour in Vancouver was better even – I seriously considered sleeping in my car while my friend was already asleep. Very gross atmosphere. Yiuck! Room Tip: No room would be your best bet on this disgusting place.

Serious bedbug problem, do NOT stay here! My friend was covered in bites after one night, this place is disgusting and should be shut down by the health board. I would rather sleep in my truck than ever stay here again. Room Tip: Do not rent a room here, it is plagued by bedbugs.

We need a low cost place to stay and this seemed a good deal but was terrible. Its hard to find a motel takeing animals and let you smoke but this place was terrible dirty and the manager was real bad when she wouldn’t give us money back for leaving early. She seemed a bit crazy but we wouldn’t argue, just left. Don’t bother going here. Room Tip: you get what you pay for.

Only stayed one night, and glad as the room could be cleaner. Typical dated room with lots of chipped paint, stained grout in tub, etc. Huge clump of black hair in the tub (how do you miss that?!?) with dirty feet prints, and when I patted the bed calling my pooch to jump up, ALOT of dirt flew up. Kind of gross actually. I’m not super fussy, so dealt with it. Room was big, two queen beds (for one person), good larger flat screen tv, coffee maker, microwave, fridge, air conditioner and fan. Enough coffee for one tiny cup only in spite of having two queen beds. When I checking in the room they assigned was still not made up from the previous occupant, had to go back to the front desk and change. The manager woman seemed intoxicated or stoned or on something. If you’re the type that has to have a decent room, go elsewhere. Room Tip: Don’t stay here.

I could not believe that drunk woman at the front desk and how amazingly RUDE she was about everything, straight down to the parking spots. I recommend a different hotel unless being treated like complete garbage!!

This motel is dated, even unadequate if you are not looking for luxury; and the price is cheap. My single room, with one double bed, had a fridge, microwave, coffee maker and TV that didn’t work. Bedsprings are pokey so you sleep ontop the covers. The motel is just across the road from a small plaza with a grocery store, bank, pizza place and coffee shop. The local bus exchange is also very handy when you have to leave fast.

When i booked my room here i assumed that it was a larger size suite going by the description i got from the lying woman i spoke to on the phone. It in fact was very small. The beds and pillows where super uncomfortable and they had a musty overly used smell so gross…. The bathroom was so dirty and the small fridge we got didnt even work. Nether did the tv remote… We were unable to sleep due to a party going on right above us and i must mention the water running constently. When the party faded around 4 am the ongoing traffic took its place big rigs just flying by. A Nightmare. Room Tip: trust me do not waste your money here.

I requested non smoking rooms both stank of smoke, The bed linen stank, it was gross. There was hair in the bathroom, the sofa had stains all over it, there were dirty marks on the walls. stayed one night and i moved to a different place. Room Tip: Beware!

The bathroom is rotting and falling apart. I requested for a non-smoking and the room stink with smoke smell. Others are right about the manager. When I ask for a refund she threatened to call the cops on me. I will never go back.

With a vision of someone standing outside the Psycho-Bates shower with a knife in the air, I moved on to other motel websites with more expensive prices. I found one called The Little Green Cabin at the West Coast Motel on the harbor in downtown Ukie. It was a bit over budget at $110 a night—but it’s safe and a good deal for what I got. Like one reviewer wrote, “You get what you pay for.” No way was I paying to meet drunk Norma Bates.

GILBERT PAUL JORDAN—THE “BOOZING BARBER” SERIAL KILLER

The term “serial killer” makes us think of hi-profile monsters like Ted Bundy, who beat and strangled his victims, or the Zodiac Killer, who shot most with a gun. There’s Clifford Olson who used a hammer. Jack The Ripper who liked his knife. And Willie Pickton who drugged his ladies, cut them apart with an electric Sawzall, then fed their pieces to his pigs.

By nature, serial killers follow a specific Modus Operandi—an M.O. peculiar to their wares. Some strangle, some shoot, some smash, and some slash. But the most unique and unsuspecting method of serial killing I’ve heard of came from Gilbert Paul Jordan, aka the “Boozing Barber”, who got his victims comatose drunk then finished them off by pouring straight vodka down their throats. He intentionally alcohol-poisoned at least nine women—possibly dozens more.

Gilbert Jordan was a monster from the 1980’s operating in the Down Town East Side of Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. Today, the skid row DTES of Vancouver is still one of the most dangerous, crime and drug-ridden inner cities of the world. In the DTES, the most popular drug of choice is still alcohol—ethanol as it’s known in the coroner and toxicologist world.

Jordan was born in 1931 and started a crime career in his twenties by kidnapping and raping a five-year-old aboriginal girl. He beat the charges and went on to commit more sexual assaults including abducting a woman from a mental institute and raping her, too. Jordan bounced in and out of jail. He continued to prey on the helpless and downtrodden, especially alcoholic women from the First Nations culture. Gilbert Jordan, himself, became a raging alcoholic and consumed over fifty ounces of vodka per day.

Jordan learned barbering skills while in prison. Between jail sentences, he set up a barber shop on East Hastings Street in the heart of Vancouver’s DTES, being a regular fixture in the seedy bar scene. He blended easily and was not at all intimidating—short, stocky, balding, with thick glasses.

Jordan was a well-known mark for buying vulnerable aboriginal women drinks and he’d take them from the bars to his barber shop or a room which he kept in a derelict hotel. Here they’d party till they passed out. It’s estimated that hundreds of women binge drank with Jordan during his spree from 1980 to 1987.

Overdose deaths in the DTES were common.

The majority were intravenous drug users, many having a lethal toxin level amplified with mixed use of ethanol. It’s still that way today. But overdose deaths from ethanol consumption alone are rare. Usually, heavy drinkers reach a blood-ethanol limit where they pass out—long before ethanol effects shut down their central nervous system. The few deaths from ethanol alone are almost always caused by an unconscious victim aspirating on vomit—not from reaching a lethal blood-ethanol-content. A BEC of 0.35% (35mg of ethanol per 100 milliliters of blood) is considered the start of the lethal range. Note that 0.08% is the standard for drunk driving.

During Jordan’s run, there were increasingly suspicious amounts of aboriginal women deaths from shockingly high BEC. They included:

Ivy Rose — 0.51
Mary Johnson — 0.44
Barbara Paul — 0.47
Mary Johns — 0.76
Patricia Thomas — 0.51
Patricia Andrew — 0.79
Vera Harry — 0.49
Vanessa Buckner — 0.50
Edna Slade — 0.55

When Edna Slade was found dead in Gilbert Jordan’s hotel room, and it became apparent Jordan was the common denominator in many similar deaths, Vancouver Police put Jordan under surveillance. From October 12^th to November 26^th, 1987, VPD observed Jordan “search out native Indian women in the skid row area of Vancouver and take them back to his hotel room for binge-drinking”.

VPD officers listened from outside Jordan’s door and recorded him saying phrases like “Have a drink. Down the hatch, baby. Twenty bucks if you drink it right down. See if you’re a real woman. Finish that drink. Down the hatch, hurry, right down. You need another drink. I’ll give you fifty bucks if you can take it right down. I’ll give you ten, twenty, fifty dollars. Whatever you want. Come on, I want to see you get it all down. Get it right down.”

On four occasions during the surveillance, police intervened and remove the comatose victims to the hospital.

Gilbert Jordan was convicted of manslaughter in the death of Vanessa Buckner. The prosecution used similar fact evidence from the other eight identified deaths. He was sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment. This was reduced to nine years on appeal and he served only six. When Jordan was paroled in 1994, he went right back to the business of stalking alcoholic aboriginal women. He was being watched by VPD and immediately sent back to prison for parole violation and an additional sexual assault. He served out his sentenced but was released in 2000, again returning to a life of chronic alcoholism and serial predation.

Gilbert Jordan, the Boozing Barber, died of the disease called alcoholism in 2006.

* * *

Ethanol, or ethyl alcohol, has been used by humans for thousands of years for its relaxation effect of euphoria and lowering social inhibitions. Drinking ethanol is widely accepted around the western world and is an enormous economic force.

Ethanol abuse is a contributing factor in untold tragedies.

Despite ethanol’s popularity as a social interactor, the medical pathophysiology considers any amount of BEC to be clinically poisonous. Ethanol is metabolized by the liver at a rate of about 50 ml (1.7 fluid ounce) per 90 minutes. That’s like two beers or one 9-ounce glass of wine every hour and a half. Drink more than you can absorb and you’ll get drunk. Wake up still drunk and you’re hung-over.

The acute effects of an ethanol overdose vary according to many factors. The body mass and tolerance to the drug are primary as is the rate of consumption. Ultimately, acute ethanol poisoning depresses the body’s central nervous system, causing the respiratory system to shut down and the victim asphyxiates.

These are the average symptomatic presentations of ethanol poisoning in relation to BEC:

02 – 0.07% — Intoxication and euphoria
08 – 0.19% — Ataxia (loss of body control ), poor judgment, labile mood
20 – 0.29% — Advanced ataxia, extremely poor judgment, nausea
30 – 0.35% — Stage 1 anesthesia, memory collapse
35 – 0.39% — Comatose
40 + — Respiratory failure, sudden death

In my time as a police officer—then as a coroner—I attended lots of deaths where ethanol was a contributing factor. Very few were acute ethanol poisoning deaths, though. Many were mixed drug overdoses, especially mixing booze with prescription pills. Then there were suffocating on puke cases, suicides while pissed, fatal motor vehicle crashes driven by drunks, and violent homicides done during ethanol-fueled anger and inebriation.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not slamming the social use of ethanol. I’ve been around the booze scene my whole life and still enjoy decent wine and good scotch, although I’ve never had a taste for beer.

I grew up in a socio-economic environment where rampant alcoholism was common. It was accepted. Grant Robertson—I worked with Grant in my teens—Grant was proud of his breathalyzer certificate proving he was caught behind the wheel at a 0.44% BEC. True story. I saw the paper. Grant was a die-hard—a chronic alcoholic with forty years of practice. I don’t think Grant ever went below two-five.

As a young cop, I brought an old guy in for a blow. I couldn’t tell if he was drunk but he’d caused a minor car accident and slightly smelled of liquor. Legally, I had to demand a breathalyzer test. He pushed the needle to a 0.36% and I’ll never forget the breathalyzer operator’s remark “You’re no stranger to alcohol, are you?”

People have different tolerances to ethanol. And different physiological responses.

I’ve worked with cops who were drunk on duty, seen judges half-cut on the bench, had my pilot pass out before time to depart, and I’ve woken in places unknown. I’ve had countless laughs, spent way too much money on time pissed away, and have stories from nights in the bars.

But I still can’t get clipped in my buddy Dave’s chair without thinking of Gilbert Paul Jordan, the “Boozing Barber” Serial Killer of the Down Town East Side of Vancouver.

BEAUTY IN YOUR BACKYARD

Nanaimo is a small city of 80,000 on the east side of Vancouver Island – twenty miles across the Pacific Ocean from Vancouver, British Columbia, in Canada. Nanaimo is also called The Harbour City. It’s one of the most beautiful settings in the world and it’s my backyard.

From my sunroom windows, where I love to write, I look over Nob Hill Park and Nanaimo’s inner harbour. In the distance are snow-capped coastal mountains, the Gulf Islands, and the happening city of Vancouver in British Columbia’s Lower Mainland.

This morning I took a walk around my neighbourhood. It’s in Nanaimo’s old city section and the downtown waterfront. I do this every day that I can, but today was such a gorgeous explosion of spring that I took out my iPhone and began snapping shots. The idea popped-in that I’d share this with you.

Across the street from my front door I cut through Nob Hill Park. It was developed in the 1800’s when Nanaimo was a booming coal and lumber town. Thankfully, they preserved this little gem which is the rocky, high-point of downtown. It’s dotted in huge Douglas Firs, Garry Oaks, Big-leaf Maples, and Flowering Dogwoods. Twenty years ago this was a dangerous place where hookers turned tricks, junkies shot-up, and one vicious murder that I remember. Today there’s moms pushing toddlers on swings, dogs running free, and teenagers smoking pot in fresh ocean air.

Heading down Old Victoria Road, I passed the old firehall. It’s now a trendy grille that serves the best sushi ever. Outside, on the boulevard, a stop-in-your-tracks trio of Dogwoods blooms full. They’re British Columbia’s official tree and you can see why.

Rounding Victoria Crescent, I passed daffodils, tulips, rhododendrons, and flowering cherries. The old Cambie hotel on the left was open early and slinging beer, but the Queens on the right waited a crowd come the night.

The usual street suspects appeared.

I see them every day and nick-named some. Mister Mann is out for a stroll. Lifer was talking to Osama Bin Ladin. As a cop who put him away, I supported Lifer’s early release – he’s on life parole for 2^nd degree murder. I don’t know Osama’s story, but he looks for all the world like the guy who the Seals smoked in Abbottabad. Gary strummed his guitar and talked to himself and some new kid squatted with cap out for money. None of them bothered anybody.

I started the China Steps, passing The Thirsty Camel which has a Middle-Eastern bench outside made of dried straw and horseshit. Serious. There was a face I hadn’t seen in a while, so I stopped and asked her what’s up. Vivian had all her worldly possessions in a folded cart; two leashed cats attached. She called herself an educated poor person with a Bachelor of Science but suffered depression. I gave her 10 bucks for breakfast.

Commercial Street made me smile. On the west are buildings from the turn of last century, perfectly preserved. On the east – the new Conference Center where they did an architectural masterpiece blending new with old. The street was bustling with people. Sidewalk café’s served eggs bennies with hash-browns and Serious Coffee at the museum had long lineups.

Diana Krall Plaza is tributed to… Diana Krall, the world famous jazz musician who still calls Nanaimo home. Intriguing wood and metal sculptures resembling piano key strikers mixed into planters with flowers and palm trees. Tourists and locals sat drinking coffee, reading books, and scanning newspapers.

A roar of a Harley with strait-pipes turned my head. I followed him up to The Palace Hotel, wondering if he had Hell’s Angels colours. We’ve got a chapter in Nanaimo, but most of the bikers are old and decrepit like The Palace itself. He parked his bike and got off. Nope, no death-head backpatch, but he swore in disgust, then picked garbage from the sidewalk and stuffed it in a black, metal trash can.

I passed the Flying Fish, where you can spend half your day and half your fortune, the Modern Café which reflects the 50’s, the Elephant Room, and at the end of the street, Nanaimo’s showpiece – the Great National Land Building – constructed of local sandstone and brick.

Ahead was St. Pauls Anglican church and the cenotaph which honors the dead from two world wars, Korea, and thankfully no one from Afghanistan. A block up – the old courthouse where the police and sheriffs hosted an open house. I looked at the second floor and thought back to testifying in that majestic, old room with maple panelling, stained glass, and royal-red carpets. A hundred years ago prisoners were sentenced to death in that court. I looked east and saw Gallows Point on Protection Island. No need to wonder the name.

I scooted down concrete stairs and onto the seawall. Float planes noisily came and went. Ferries busted wakes in glass-calm water with trips to nearby islands and Vancouver. Boats of all sizes and prices were there. Tugboats and seineboats. Sailboats and rowboats. Gillnetters, crab fishers, prawners, and trollers. Dragonboats practised races. Pleasure boats headed out. A research vessel and a multi-million dollar executive yacht tied themselves a float.

The seawall gathers people. Coffeshops, nicknacks, clothing stores, and restaurants. Old couples walked hand-in-hand, dad’s pushed strollers, and dogs walked bent on a purpose. Troller’s fish & chips, a floating eatery, shouted the smell of deep-fried halibut, cod, and fresh salmon.

Nanaimo’s waterfront experience is far more than material. It’s the sights and sounds of the wildlife.

In Maffeo-Sutton Park a family of river otters gorged on Dungenous crab, looked-on by harbour seals and a big ol’ Stellar sea lion who was pissed-off about something. Squawks of freeloading gulls were backed by conspiring calls of common crows. Canada geese honked from a low-tide beach, cautiously watched by a Great Blue Heron. Topping off was twitters of hundreds of songbirds and a fluttering fly-by of a Belted Kingfisher.

I circled Cameron Island, the signature waterfront residential development where condos range from 300 to a million. Across Front Street was Port Place, the new shopping plaza with all you can need. Following the sidewalk at McGregor park, I saw new sculptures near the town clock – stained glass and stainless steel in the shape of some waves. Fitting.

The Bastion was ahead. It’s Nanaimo’s historical prize, even ahead of Nanaimo Bars and the annual bathtub race. Built in 1853 as a Hudson’s Bay Trading Company post it was recently disassembled, refitted, and now better than new. Some jackass wrote into the local paper fearful they’d never be able to get it back together. Maybe he should’ve checked that they’d numbered the pieces.

Coal is what started Nanaimo.

You’d never know it from up here, but there’s a labyrinth of tunnels and shafts down below, hacked by pick and shovel in 100 years of mining the fossil fuel of the day. So much of Nanaimo’s history started with coal and it’s still with us today – Chinatown, collieries, coffins, and certified trade unions.

I crossed the Bastion bridge over Terminal Avenue and hiked up Fitzwilliam Street to the Heritage Mews in the Old City Quarter. More coffee shops, dress stores, shoes, lingerie, and a clairvoyant named Yvonne giving readings.