Vancouver Day 4

I woke up and cleaned out my groceries but left my uncookable eggs [I have no idea what they'll do with them, probably throw them out].  I went to the coffee place the Slovenia guy suggested but I think he had it wrong.  The coffee was okay, and it was busy like a breakfast place instead of a coffee shop.  They were busy so I felt like I was in the way just having coffee and writing in this journal.  I went back to the indian place and had lunch.  Lamb in ginger curry.  [Decent meal, I'm glad I went with the ginger for a neat twist on it]

  I came back, showered, grabbed my stuff and checked out.  Now that I'm done writing I'll wander the town for a few hours till my greyhound. 

September 18th (contd)

  I walked up to Gas town and had a look around.  I checked out the steam powered clock, but didn't stay long.  Souvenir shops aren't interesting at this point.

  I spun around and figured I'd head to chinatown.  When I found it, I realized I'd have my fill of chinatown in Calgary.  I skimmed through pretty quick as (like all chinatowns), it was composed mainly of gift shops and restaurants/bakeries.  It was big, but nothing terribly interesting.

  Looking back, I'm sure my mood didn't really make my stops all that exciting, but I'm sure that even if I did them first, they wouldn't have been my trip highlights.

  I got back to the hostel with about an hour and a half to spare.  I headed to the arcade to kill some time.



Random chicken doing stand up



  I wanted to eat before I left for the 13 hour bus, so I walked over to Japadog.  I ordered the 3 cheese spicy terimayo dog.  The hotdog had 3 cheeses in the dog, and it was topped with caramalized onions, teriyaki sauce and japanese mayo, garnished with some shredded seaweed.  I also ordered a ramune ball-bottle drink, lychee.  I ended up showing some nice middle aged women how to open/drink it.

  My hot dog was again amazing and expensive...  The yakisoba dog sign wasn't there any more.  The yakisoba dog was higher quality, but I still really liked the cheesy spicy dog.  It's a good thing I don't live here, I'd eat expensive gourmet hot dogs all the time.

  By the time I trained over to the terminal I had missed my 6pm (or would have if I didn't change into my comfy pants), and did my photobooth.  I wasn't stressed about it though because I had a backup at 6:45 that would transfer onto the one I missed.  So now I am on my way to Kamloops to switch to the bus heading to Banff.  This bus left a bit late so I hope it doesn't miss the other one.  I didn't charge my camera battery, so I hope I can do that in Banff for an hour or so before heading into the city.



[I saw a bunch of ferrari's like this when I was heading to Canada place.  It was kind of random, but there was a bit of a car show in the middle of a street that was cut off.  I took pics for Kit]

Vancouver Day 3 - Japadog/ Granville Island

  I went into downtown, marking my first city cycle ever.  It was really great.  I was going as fast as a car with all the benefits of being a pedestrian.  This city is pretty cycle friendly [I originally had reservations, because I didn't actually know anything about cycling on the road... nor did I have a drivers license].

  My first stop was at Japadog.  I ordered the yakisoba dog, which was soba noodles with okonomiyaki sauce and pickled ginger.  The hot dog itself was really good quality and it was delicious.  I snapped a pic of the dude handing me the dog, but was a bit premature and caught him halfway to a peace sign. [Japadog was one of the highlights of this trip, and I have no idea why]

  I headed down to the granville island after, and parked my bike before going across via the aquabus ferry. [The bike rental came complete with a lock]

  Granville Island (actually a peninsula) was interesting.  There was a large enclosed public market where you could get a bit of the local goods that are a bit pricey.  It reminded me of the farmers market in Ottawa.  The rest of the island had lots of buskers and small specialty shops like 'Lobster Man',

which sold fresh shellfish.  I got a card with a picture of a whale from a native shop.  I also saw a great busker duo called 'Maria in the Shower'.  One guy played accordian as base chords and he sang/played trumpet.  The other guy had a stand up bass.  They played some ethnic tunes from all over the place and the trumpet guy even sang a song on the guys bass as he played it.  I bought their cd, but I doubt it will be nearly as good as them live.  They were promoting their show later that night but I opted out. [The experience of seeing them was amazing, but as suspected their cd was pretty mediocre.  Definately great entertainers]

  I walked by a really bad comedian who was making fun of passers by.  I can't stand bad comedians. [I would later see this guy again]

  I took the ferry back across and biked up to stanley park to the bike rental place, to drop off my bike.  It was 4:30pm-ish so I did all my laundry and prepped for leaving.  Afterwards, I settled my amazon order with Nita and checked my email.

  I headed to the indian restaurant Kyle suggested, but it had an hour and a half wait.  It looked posh.  Instead I went to a sushi place called Mr. Sushi as suggested by a hostel worker.  I was skeptical, because he didn't seem to like the sushi so much as the price [my first hint that the place was bad, was that it was called mr. sushi].  I was right and got a lot of sushi in a combo, but it wasn't great.  The place itself had a lot of cool sumo's on the wall. [Another tipoff that the place was probably not great.  It seemed like a family owned, with the owner's brother making the sushi.  There was definately no love in that meal, but it was decent enough]

  With not much else to do, I stopped by a place and got some drinks.  There was a comedy festival and they closed off the main downtown street [That bad comedian from Granville was out and making fun of passers-by, also he was trying to rally some people to get a group to watch his act.  It was really desperate and hard to watch, so I walked past, did I mention that I hate bad comedians?].  For the festival as a promotion, they had live roosters for the best "why did the chicken cross the road?" joke.  They were huge and looked unimpressed [Roosters I imagine sleep early.  It was kind of sad because it was close to midnight, and there were a bunch of drunk douchebags yelling to the roosters trying to be cool or whatever douchebags do to get attention.  The poor roosters would wake up momentarily, and attempted to go back to sleep.  Poor birds].  I missed Anton (the kiwi) and didn't hang out with Nicola (the Montreal roomate), so I was solo that night.  After the drinks I felt a bit low and homesick, so I late-night called Nita and felt better [I didn't drink enough for it to be considered a drunk dial, but I was a few beers away from that haha].  I went out and had a super mario dog for a place called 'Dougie Dogs'.  It was pricey, but the hot dog was really high quality.  With that and Japadog, Vancouver has some great gourmet hot dogs.  The mario dog had a cheesy jalepino dog with lots of mushroom and cheese.  Really good, but I give the edge to Japadog because it had a better bun/dog ratio. [Also, I got the Mario dog for obvious reasons.  I'm sure if I chose a different dog, it'd be even better]

  I went to bed after.  good sleep. [Surprising since I was in the heart of the downtown club scene where they actually close off the roads every weekend.  In the end though, it was pretty quiet 4 floors up]

Vancouver Day 3 - Stanley Park

Sept 17 Friday

  I met an interesting guy named Marcus at breakfast this morning.  He's from Germany and has been here since the olympics.  Apparently he worked 18 days straight for 10 hours a day.  He said it funded him for a couple months... just cleaning after tourists.  I also gave a call to Nita this morning and will have to settle an amazon bill with her [The Walking Dead Compendium, which has recently been turned into a hit show].  My card was cancelled and amazon can't charge me.  I don't want to put my credit card # in these computers so I'll ask Nita to do it over the phone.

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Sept 18th Saturday

  Yesterday was a pretty full day, although less so than Thursday.  I left towards Stanley Park in the morning.  When I was about a block away, I saw some bike rental places [Anton, the kiwi, told me he opted against the bike, and he was exhausted by the end of the day.  I learned from his experience and decided to go with it].  It was a nice day so I figured I'd rent a bike.  The guy said it'd take about an hour to go around Stanley Park along the 'sea wall', which is a huge path along the shore.  I rented a one speed, with back pedal brakes.  It had been years and years since I've ridden, since I rollerblade nowadays.

  I took a leisure pace and would snap pictures as I was going, or stop if the picture required some more focus.  I rode for about 15 mins before I realized I was going the wrong way, into Stanley Park [The trail I was supposed to take just circled the whole park, but I didn't know this until I got onto the path].

  I back-tracked and found the proper path around.  The sea view was nice and I could smell the salt air.  About 20 mins along the path I saw some totem poles.  I parked the bike, snapped some pics and was off again.

  On the path were lots of joggers and other cyclists.  There was a seperate lane for pedestrians and cycle paths were very well marked.  I caught views of N[orth] Vancouver and Grouse Mountain on the way.  The estimate of an hour was probably based off of a no-stop idea.  I took about an hour and a half with the getting lost and totem poles. [It was a bit of a low tide at some points, so there'd be a bad sea smell in a section or two of the trail, but it was rare and there was a nice light breeze]

  I was having fun on the bike and didn't want to walk across town to Granville Island, so I held onto the bike.  An employee told me I could get a half-day (6 hours) for the same price as the 3 hours anyways.

[Up next: I bike into the city!]

Vancouver Day 2 - Capilano / Machete

  The bridge was sturdy but moved a lot when people were on it.  I knew it wouldn't break, but it swayed.  By the end my nerves were shot.  I was in fear-stress from the chairlift and suspension bridge and was mentally exhausted [Truly, I was completely burnt out by the end of this.  Between the lack of food, constant fear mode and the long hike... I was very much spent].  The park itself had a tree-to-tree bridge system like in Robin Hood (more heights) and a bunch of nature-y things [I walked the whole tree bridge system, but I did it really quick].  It would have been fun, but I had just come from Jasper and Grouse mountain and had enough of nature.  In the end I faced my fears twice that day and I headed back before my transfer from Grouse Mountain expired.




That little house is the cable car chalet



  I got back, showered and dressed in time for 7pm.  My breakfast was at 8:30am, and since then I had an apple and a few granola bars. [Fuji apple!]

  I went to Tsunami-sushi on recommendation from the Slovenia guy.  the sushi was very, very good.  It was a rotating sushi place, where you grab the sushi you want.  They add up your plates and charge you based on what price each colour plate represented.  I had eaten at a place like this in Japan.  I made sure to eat the hand pressed sushi and tried the different fish filets. [I could have, and probably should have had a bit more, but it was still a good meal of protein and rice, so I was satisfied]

  When I got back I saw a new roomate who was also french.  He was from Montreal and looking for a place to teach french for a few months.  He's quiet, but seems like a nice guy.  We went out to see Machete, which was a ridiculous movie, entertaining though.

  I had forgot to mention the Kiwi roomate, who has been travelling the world since May! [He did a bunch of Europe and Asia by this time]  Too intense.  I told him about Japadog and he said it was great [He tried it that day].  I'll have to try it tomorrow.  It's 1:30am now, so I should sleep.

Vancouver Day 2 - Grouse Grind

 When I got to the mountain I met some fellow hikers.  I saw that there were neat wood carved statues out of big tree trunks.  I started up the trail and realized it was very well maintained and set up.  The trail was pretty steep and set up with natural and man-made steps.  Essentially it was just a giant staircase.  I paced myself slow and stopped for pictures often.  I figured I'd get the most of the hike.  I gradually passed and got passed by hikers.  It really was a never-ending staircase.  The air was cool, but not cool enough and I was a sweaty mess.  The higher I got the foggier it was because of the clouds.

  At the halfway mark I asked a kid to take my picture.  He looked pretty beat and had no supplies so I offered up an apple.  We sat and chatted for a good 10 mins.  He was 19 and trying to get in shape.  This was actualy his 2nd time up that day [which was pretty crazy since it's a pretty good workout as is].  Obviously he was in shape, but I admired his young dedication [He was on the goal to be the best shape of his life, which is much more than I did at his age].  He took off up the mountain and I continued on.  I pushed a little harder to get a bit better time, but still stopped to get a few pics.

  When I got to the top, it was about 1 hour 25 mins.  I was a bit disappointed and felt that I maybe should have tried for a good time.  Without the chat and a bit more effort (and a little less sight seeing) I could have made the hour and 10.  I only thought this because the people I started with all beat my time.  But I guess I wouldn't see the others [who I passed earlier].  On second thought, I'm glad I took a leisure pace.

  The top was a lot more than a chalet, which is what I expected.  With the cable car up, the top was an actual attraction.  I made it up just in time to see a lumberjack show.  It was basically a show of the lumberjack competitions on T.V.

  It was really family with some risque comments that would fly over kids' heads.  They did the chop, axe throw, log rolling and a really cool trunk climb.  They scrambled up the tree wicked fast and just free falled down.  It was pretty intense.  The showmen were log-climb champions in competitions, pretty neat [for those who haven't seen a lumberjack competition, definately check it out, it's pretty interesting.  I was always drawn to those competitions on tv for some strange reason].  Now I know what two of them do when not competing, giving free shows on a mountain in B.C.  After, I took a chairlift... which was just a skilift up to the peak.  I hesitated due to my fear of heights, but went for it... no regrets.

  The entire time I was clutching the safety bar and sweating.  At the top there wasn't much, but the view was nice.  Going down was scarier than going up because I had a full view looking down.  I kept hoping it wouldn't stop (which it did a few times briefly going up) causing the chair to sway [It was me by myself on a whole chair swaying back and forth praying that the chair would start moving again].  I was starving as it was 4pmish and went down on the cable car.  While going in I saw a dude with a small cage.  Apparently he was a parks guy relocating a douglas squirrel, which was covered so I couldn't see.  On the way back I debated on the bridge as it was the only thing that day with a real entry fee.  I decided I'd just speed through the attractions since I got student fee from the hostel card.

[Part 3 of my super long day coming up next]