Working in the Salt Mine

Four or five years, before Ol '95 entered my life, I rented a car and took a two-week road trip in southeast Canada. I took an overnight ferry to the Iles de Madeleine (in English the Magdalen Islands). I didn't keep a journey blog then and I seem to have lost all the pictures on old computer crashes.
There on that island while riding a rented scooter in the rain, I "discovered" a salt mine!
Now on another Canadian island an entire continent to the West, I discovered another salt production facility!

Saltwest Harvestry

The salt mine on the Iles de Madeleine is one of the biggest producers of ice melt salt from the Atlantic to the Great Lakes. The mine is hundreds of feet underground beneath the island and the Atlantic. It has been mined for decades. It is so huge that dozens of dump trucks, huge earth scrapers and other equipment are used in the mining process. The salt is loaded on barges and ships just as grain would be and shipped to other ports.

I have searched online and can't find any pictures or links to this mine. Perhaps there is one in French because the Isles de Madeleine are part of the province of Quebec and most people do not speak English. I even had a private tour by the one person who spoke English. (By the way, for safety reasons visitors are not allowed in the mine,)

I was amazed. Although I have always heard about working in the salt mine, I had no idea.

The Big Facility

Who would guess that here on Vancouver Island on the other side of Canada, I would find one of the smallest salt producers in the world!
Meet Saltwest in Otter Point on Vancouver Island.

New Kettles and Bottling System Ready to Go

Here the production is all by hand one boiled pot at a time

Eight Hours in the Sun

or even more slowly, one solar-dried tray at a time! All from salt water taken from the Salish Sea right here in old Juan de Fuca's strait.

Little did Jessica know when she decided to start this business that this Salish See water had the lowest salinity content in the Pacific.
Undaunted, she has grown her business from boiling a pot on a butane flame to just installing new-fangled electric steam kettles.
Her husband Jeff was able to quit his job as a plumber and put a lot of that knowledge to work. They now desalinate the water to produce the salt. Health inspectors have told her the water is so pure she should bottle it instead of using it to water the garden. Watch for Salish Pure on her web site.

A Fine Selection of Gourmet and Bath Salts

While you are at it, buy a few bags of the gourmet herb-flavored salt and know that her mother volunteered two days a week baking it in the oven.

Garlic Flavored Salt Waiting for Oven Time