Canada Day Fun

Lazy morning today as we all stumbled out of bed at various times to shower and grab whatever we felt like for breakfast. Naturally, we all had Welsh tea, though, as Jane had brought some with her (for me). While Don worked feverishly to obtain some B&B/hotel reservations and to arrange a rental car, Jane and I had a lovely chat outside on the patio.

Mid-afternoon, we were ready for the long but leisurely drive through the University of British Columbia endowment lands and along the "beach" route (which included Spanish Banks, Locarno, Jericho, and Kitsilano beaches on the south side of the downtown area and English Bay on the north side of the Burrard Bridge). We stopped once to admire the view over towards Vancouver Island but kept going until we reached the Totem Park area of Stanley Park. Here are Don and Jane mimicking one of the totems.

After wandering around admiring all the native artwork, we walked over to the seawall to see the Lion's Gate Bridge from a distance. Then we continued on to see Prospect Point and the statue of the girl in a wetsuit just past Lumberman's Arch.

Over the bridge we went, quickly realising that something was wrong when we saw all the traffic lined up to go back the way we'd come. Apparently, there was a woman on the Second Narrow's Bridge trying to jump and the police had blocked the entire bridge both ways, causing a terrible traffic jam on the north side of the inlet. We knew we were going to be stuck for hours over there, so I decided to keep on driving all the way to Horseshoe Bay. We took the lower, more scenic route so Don and Jane could see the water, the sailboats, and some ships making their way out into the Strait of Georgia.

Stopping at Whytecliffe Park, they both were in awe at the majesty of the scenery. Here they are just looking out over the water from high up the side of one of our many mountains.

We were starting to get rather hungry so we drove into Horseshoe Bay and had fish & chips at Trolls, famous for its fresh, handmade chips. A leisurely stroll along the pier followed dinner where I caught this shot of Don and Jane in front of the anchor opposite the restaurant. Then we headed back down the Upper Levels Highway to see if the traffic had thinned out.

Originally, we were going to watch the fireworks in West Vancouver but it turned out there wouldn't be parking available. So followed Plan B and cut through the west side of Stanley Park all the way to Ferguson Point. There we could be found, sitting on a park bench all bundled up with warm blankets, admiring the sunset (red sky at night, sailor delight) until promptly at 10:30 pm, fireworks lit up the sky directly across from us. All in all, a delightful day - and now sleepy, I'm off to bed.