A Beautiful City
Trip Start
Aug 15, 2005
1
4
31
Trip End
Dec 21, 2005
Vancouver,
British Columbia,
Canada
Thursday, August 25, 2005
Well I didn't sleep a wink last night and I don't think Dan did either. Liz rang the hotel last night 1.30 am English time and I was so pleased to speak to her, we chatted for a good 10 minutes. The air conditioning in the room kept switching itself on and off and we had to be up and downstairs in the lobby for 5 am. The alarm went off at 4.30 am and we were dressed and waiting for our Yellow Cab at 5 am, it was still dark outside. The guy on security called another firm as it was 5.10 and our taxi had not turned up...typical! The next minute a car was waiting, we were not sure what kind of car it was but it was posh with leather seats and stuff. It wasn't until half way to the airport I saw that the window in the back had been put through and I was sitting on the glass! It was really dodgy and I was glad to get to the airport! He overcharged us as well! Anyway, the view of Manhattan when we left was great and worth getting up early for
Amazing View from Grouse Mountain
. We checked in our rucksacks and went straight to the departure lounge. We were flying with Air Canada an airbus, with 3 seats on each side of the plane. It was Dan's turn to sit next to the window but when we got on, we were one row behind the first class seats so had much more leg room, Dan let me sit next to the window again. We were the only English people on the plane! There was a connecting flight to Tokyo I think. When we arrived in Vancouver, we had a lecture from Customs about how long we were planning to stay, what we did before we left and how much money we had in our accounts..after a long conversation we had our passports stamped again (YEY) and off we went to catch the Aiporter bus for $12 each (canadian) to the Hotel Vancouver where we got off and walked a few streets to Richards Street where we had booked 4 nights accommodation in the Urban Hideaway Guesthouse. It was an old Victorian building tucked away up some steps. It had a lovely decking area with a BBQ and only 5 guestrooms. We had been upgraded for free to the best room with the view. The facilities were great, it had 2 shared bathrooms and we were free to use the kitchen and lounge along with the TV, DVD player and library of books. It was home from home! We nipped down to T&T this little Chinese Supermarket in Chinatown to get a stock of food that would make us breakfast for 4 days, labelled it up and put it away in the kitchen
Amazing!
. The T&T supermarket was an experience in itself! It was full of tanks of live lobsters and massive fish ready for people to buy and it smelt horrible! The only thing we recognised was nestle cheerios and maltesers! We couldn't stop laughing!We took a walk down to Canada Place, a 5 minute walk, the view was beautiful. The cruise ship, Princess Dawn was docked there, you could see the boats and then the backdrop of mountains and trees, it was just beautiful and a big change from New York. We walked back to the guest house, did our washing from New York and watched a DVD before going to bed.
Tuesday 23 August 2005
We woke this morning at 7 am probably as we'd fell asleep quite early last night. The little church across the road had its bells ringing for a long time so my ear plugs worked wonders! We went down to the kitchen and made some breakfast. We were planning on going to Grouse Mountain today but it was cloudy over the mountains so decided to leave it until tomorrow.
Instead we talk a walk along the sea wall from Canada Place to Stanley Park. We walked half way round the lost lagoon and then went to see the Totem Poles
Bike ride round Stanley Park
. The view across Coal Harbour was amazing. It was so nice to get some fresh air. The skies above us were clear and it was a lovely sunny day. We stopped for ice-cream (Klondikes...Cornettos!) and went to the Vancouver Aquarium to see the Beluga Whales, which we've never seen before, stayed for the Dolphin show then walked back the guest house past a 'sandwich' diner bar and sat eating lunch watching people walk by. We sat listening to music in the loung and rested our weary legs. We watched another DVD tonight!Wednesday 24 August 2005
We woke up this morning at 7 am to the sound of workmen digging up the road, the whole building was shaking! We had breakfast again and then decided to do a trip to Grouse Mountain. We walked to catch the Seabus which took us to Lonsdale Quay on North Vancouver. The Seabus was about a 10 minute ride across the Burrard Inlet. We then caught the connecting 236 bus to Grouse Mountain about 20 minutes from the Seabus station. The houses were lovely and big with big gardens! We reached the bottom of Grouse Mountain, got off the bus and queued up for tickets to take the Gondala to the top. Each Gondola held 100 passengers and as one went up, one came down. The ride to the peak lasted only 8 minutes but the views were like something we had never seen before. The skies were crystal blue and the temperature was 27 degrees
Cruise Ship at Canada Place
. They say Vancouver is the most beautiful city and we have never seen anything like it before! When we reached the top, you could see for miles. There was a snow capped mountain 150 miles away which looked like it was floating, it was just breathtaking! The mountain peak is 4,100 feet above Vancouver, the pictures will show you what it looks like when you see them! We walked around for a while and managed to catch a view of the Wolves sleeping in the Wolf habitat, we didn't however catch a glimpse of the Grizzly Bears which was a bit disappointing, we waited around for ages as well! There was a bird show and a lumberjack show on. Now this is great, the chairlift they use for the winter season was operating and it was fab! We sat on it and went right down the mountain and back up again for free! I was dying to have a snowboard attached to my feet! My first go on a chairlift YEY!We caught the packed out bus back to the Seabus terminal and the Seabus back to Vancouver, grabbed some quick slices of pizza and sat on the deck at the Guesthouse and chilled out. We hadn't decided on our plans for the next few day so took the skytrain to Central Pacific station to find out about the details for the West Coast USA pass. We could'nt purchase them as we hadn't got our passports but Jason was most helpful and will help us out tomorrow when we go back.
Thursday 25 August 2005
Up at 7 am again with the workmen
Dan on Grouse Mountain!
! Our last night in the upgraded room so probably won't hear them tomorrow! We went to catch up on some emails at the Internet Cafe and had loads of help from Liz to sort out some accommodation in Victoria on Vancouver Island as we plan to go there for 2 days as the Whale Watching is supposed to be amazing...thanks Liz you are such a great help! Flying to and from somewhere is easy but when you don't know the area it gets tricky! Vancouver's transport system is easy but you have to get used to it first! They have buses, skytrains, seabuses and a main terminal with all different kinds of trains and buses!!!! We went back to Central Pacific station and booked our West Coast 30 day pass which will take us to Seattle, Portland, San Francisco, Grand Canyon, Arizona and LA. We are cutting the time down in the states as it's more expensive over here so may be leaving for Fiji early...will keep you updated.
We then went and got a picnic lunch together and borrowed the bikes from Ken and Janine. We biked all the way round Stanley Park seawall, it was so beautiful. We actually went too far and ended up down False Creek but the ride was great. We rode for about 3 hours and stopped on a little beach under a tree for lunch. We finished the Stanley Park loop and went back to the guesthouse. Stanley Park is great, it has a lane for Cyclists and roller bladers and a lane for walkers, it's also one way so it's a great ride and the views were brilliant! We went and bought some postcards and wrote them in the sunshine.
We leave for Vancouver Island tomorrow, it's only a 3 hour trip and worth it if we get to see the Whales so we will update you from there.
