Rocky Mountain Road Trip Day 10

 Today was our urban hiking day! It is the day that earned us the most steps and kilometers travelled by foot. Michael had several places he wanted to see. We started with Stanley Park. I'm not sure what Michael was expecting, but it certainly did not match with my expectations. We parked for the day at the Southwest corner of the park and started to walk around the Seawall. Michael's sheer frustration became quickly clear as his intention had been to be in a more urban environment and not ANOTHER nature walk! Michael had planned a quick in and out to cross the park off his bucket list, not to circumnavigate the whole park. We compromised and chose a path that cut straight across the park as I really wanted to see the Totem poles.

Beach time at Stanley park

Exploring a natural cave. David would make a great feral kid.

Michael still losing his mind that we are still in a forest instead of the concrete jungle he prefers.

Lily pads

Vancouver skyline the way I always remember it.

We then made our way into the city proper. As we walked along the harbourfront we came across filming of some sort. We continued in to the city as we all gaped at some of the more interesting architecture. A quick pitstop at A&W for lunch was our first fast food of the trip! Then we made it to Fly Over Canada. A multi-media immersive ride that Michael had been planning for weeks. Situated right next to the Disney cruise ship, this ride offers the opportunity to experience Canada in eight minutes. Amusement park like chairs lift and tilt into a 20 m spherical screen for a full 360 immersive feel. Wind, mist, and scents complete the experience. Going in with lower expectations, it was actually pretty cool. Michael, who had rather high expectations, was not disappointed.

Cool new building. Unfinished on the other side.

Bought the souvenir photo!

We continued East towards gastown. We found the steam powered clock. We also found police running with significant fire power, police dogs, and yells to clear the area. We ducked into a nearby store for a few minutes. By the time we came out, all the commotion was over. Not entirely sure what we had wandered into the middle of, but as far as we know, everything turned out well in the end. 

We continued walking south. We saw one of the homeless encampments and took a turn Westward. We passed by the old and the new public library. Chris and I had fond memories of visiting Chris's friend Ian in February of 1999 and we had taken a photo at that library. An old school photo, with film that we had to wait weeks to be developed! 

The new library

The old library

The old picture of the old library.

We turned west here, window shopping as we passed the shopping district. We saw the residential school memorial set up at St. Peter's Fireside Church, as well as some Black Lives Matter installations.

After more than 6 hours of walking over 15 km across Vancouver, we had looped back to Stanley Park. Later that evening we met up with ex-roommate Ian and his son for dinner in North Vancouver. We walked down to the waterfront and strolled down memory lane. Chris was super happy. His favourite thing in the whole world is getting together with old friends!

Michael was super happy. Even though he didn't cross everything off his list, he got to visit Vancouver!

Rocky Mountain Road Trip Day 9

 Today started off with a whale watching trip. Port Renfrew is the first community along the west coast of the island that isn't right across from the Washington state peninsula. This means that one has a combination of the protected currents of the Salish Sea as well as the North Pacific currents. There is also the benefit of only ONE whale watching company, which means any hotspot is not going to be crowded with boats. The company owners use the whale watching revenue to help fund their data collection as they work to catalogue and monitor the whale population in the area. We lucked out that the other group booked on our tour was unable to join, so we had a private 3 hour tour! First step was to get suited up in specialized flotation jumpsuits and get on board. 

As we left the inlet and got oriented, our captain told us that we would normally have 4 ft swells where we currently were floating. That day, it was less than a foot of swell. The ocean was practically flat. This meant we made record time in finding and arriving at "Everest". Everest was described as a non-fixed location based on ocean currents and temperatures where there is a large area with rich growth of plankton. This area is enriched with animal life. We saw dozens of humpback whales. Mother and child, adolescents, ones the captain recognized for sure, others that were being too shy to identify themselves. The pattern of black and white on the underside of the fluke (tail fin) is unique to each whale, like a fingerprint. As part of his work, our captain snapped some shots to identify some of our companions, but they were not being overly cooperative in showing off their flukes with their dives.

On the way to Everest

The ocean rocked some of us to sleep

Found one!

And some more

Yup, we found Everest

After a good hour of being in the middle of a dozen or so humpbacks, we took advantage of the relatively calm water to see if we could spot some orcas or other animals along the shore of the West Coast Trail. Spoiler alert: we saw much Pacific Rim National Park scenery, but no more wildlife.

After a 3 hour tour (♫ a 3 hour tour ♫) we bid Port Renfrew adieu. Before leaving the island, we wanted to do a little sight-seeing in Victoria. We drove down the coastal road as the murder mystery story unfolded. My plan had been to drive down to the legislative building and Beacon Hill park area to explore. Unfortunately, once we crossed from Esquimalt to Victoria we encountered massive crowds and street closures. Unbeknownst to us at the time, the "Northwest Deuce Days" main show was shutting down exactly the same area we had planned to explore. More than 1000 pre-1952 cars were on display and the traffic was blocked. As we still needed to get to Vancouver that afternoon, we decided that driving through Victoria was sufficient and we changed course for the Swartz Bay ferry terminal. We were less lucky this time and were told it would be a 3-4 hour wait. In the end we were the second to last vehicle allowed on to the ferry after just under a 2 hour wait. During that time we finished our audiobook and had a book club discussion about the characters and plot while we waited!

Back to the mainland for the journey back East!

Michael had been looking forward to Vancouver for the whole trip! The first stop was on the way in to Vancouver. We went to the "night market" just as it opened. Unfortunately, the line to get in to the carnival was super long! The event looked similar to the CNE. Michael was vetoed and we got back in the car to arrive at our North Vancouver AirBnB.