Vancouver is neat, they ought to host the Olympics
Trip Start
Sep 03, 2008
1
14
28
Trip End
Oct 01, 2008
Vancouver,
British Columbia,
Canada
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
First, to correct yesterday's blog, the huge trees in Stanley park are not redwoods, they are red cedars, and they are Huge! Speaking of trees, there are palm trees outside our hotel. Palm trees! And at lunch, there were palms across the street on the beach! Vancouver has very strange weather. I understand that it is very temperate because of the Ocean currents, but there are hundreds of people on the beach in Canada in mid-September! A couple of days ago we were in the place where our Alberta Clippers originate, and you Clevelanders know Alberta Clipper and Canadian air masses firsthand!
Our adventure today began at the dock. We, in typical Bob and sandy fashion, boarded a ship for a Harbor Tour. No, it was not "The Minnow", and it was not a "three-hour-tour". We love to take harbor tours, and Gray-line bus tours
Yes, a palm tree
. You really find out a lot, and this one was no exception. The Vancouver skyline is beautiful, and there seems to be no end of money in this town. bazillion dollar yachts are all over the harbor, and high-rise condos as far as the eye can see. Some of the upper floors have more landscaping on the roof than Carrabba's Restaurants!We saw Stanley Park, the Convention Center (Centre, excuse me), and the Cruise ship terminal, where those of you that have taken an Alaskan cruise no doubt embarked. We saw their large Container Ship terminal unloading countless containers of crap for Wal*Mart, and lots of seaplanes taking off and landing. I understand they fly regular routes to the surrounding islands. We even got a close-up look at some Harbor Seals.
After the cruise, we worked our way around the waterfront to "The Boathouse". It is a restaurant with an open second-floor deck overlooking the harbor (see the picture "yes, that's a palm tree"). It reminded me a little of Venice Beach in California, with all the beachgoers and the rollerbladers and cyclists going by. I just can't get over the weather. After lunch, we wandered to a little island on the South side of town, called Granville Island, home of the Granville island marketplace. The area looks like it might once have been the fishing boat docks and canneries
Beach? September? Canada???
. There are lots of buildings and train tracks. It is the strangest assortment of businesses I have ever seen in one place. There are 9 theater companies, an art college, a concrete and building supply yard, an ornamental iron forge, endless gift shops and galleries, boat chandleries, boutiques, and a farmers market three times the size of the West Side market in Cleveland. Oh, yeah, and there are restaurants and food stands and eating areas all over the place. We spent quite a bit of time, and very little money, there. We have an aversion to buying "stuff" to drag 4,500 miles home!We spent the rest of the day looking at the various neighborhoods, and the local color. Sandy was fascinated by the hedges. Most of the houses, especially along main thoroughfares, are surrounded by hedges. Not hedges, mind you, but HEDGES. They vary in height from about 15 feet high to well over 30 feet! I have no idea how they trim them. There are blocks where it is one continuous hedge from end to end. The lots are very small by our standards, but they actually cut doorways through the hedges and, in some cases, car portals. Sandy spent most of our driving time taking pictures of these doorways from the moving car! She got pretty good at it too.
Speaking of driving, I would like to take a minute to thank the guy who invented the GPS auto navigation system
Vancouver skyline
. (was that Al Gore too?) Whoever it was, he deserves to be richer than Bill Gates! Remember navigating downtowns with a rental-car map in hand trying to find attractions? Now you just push a few buttons to enter the destination, and listen to the lady who knows how to get there. You can wander off anywhere you want, and then push the "home" button, and she tells you how to get home,even after dark! I have bored Sandy stiff praising this device, I love it! It saved my marriage 11 times, and that's just today!Vancouver was wonderful. Tomorrow we leave for a 1-hour wait at the border, then a short-distance day so we can visit Seattle and tacoma. We stay in Lacey, which is just past Tacoma. At last, US gas prices again. God Bless America!
