The Return to Vancouver

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Well, the blackberry festival wasn’t quite as exciting as we hoped. Possibly something to do with the fact that no matter how hard we looked (and boy did we look hard) we could not find the promised blackberry wine stall. We have now come to the conclusion that saying there would be alcohol was just a ruse by the organisers to get people to attend. But rest assured that we consoled ourselves with some excellent blackberry cheesecake. And some excellent blackberry pie. And some superb blackberry crumble. We would have tried the blackberry shortcake too, but we were feeling a bit sick by then!

Anway, we had a very pleasant time on the Sunshine Coast. The weather there wasn’t quite as good as it gets billed: but we did see a fair amount of sunshine. We made it all the way to Lund at the end of Highway 101 (the main road the runs up the Sunshine Coast), and then we drove slowly back down again, stopping at some great places on the way. Returning to the “mainland” - I know that the Sunshine Coast is technically on the mainland, but as you can only get to it by boat it does really feel like an island - we stopped off for a spot of lunch at Whytecliff Park in West Vancouver to watch the ferries coming in and out of harbour at Horseshoe Bay. And then we pushed further east into the Lower Mainland, back up towards Hope, stopping off at Chilliwack for a quick visit to Cultus Lake (not as exciting as we’d hoped) and Harrison Hot Springs (more picturesque than we were expecting).

And we FINALLY got to see a beaver! (It may be the national animal of Canada, but they are somewhat difficult to spot as they are incredibly timid). We were staying at a Provincial Park just outside Harrison Hot Springs, and had an early evening walk around “Beaver Pond” when we noticed a very odd wake on the water: and there was a beaver happily swimming along without a care in the world. I managed to take a couple of very bad photographs before he noticed me and ran for the hills (well, his lodge at any rate).

We have spent the last couple of days pottering around the Lower Mainland & Greater Vancouver area. We spent a night at Rolley Lake near Mission, and a night in the Golden Ears Provincial Park, outside Maple Ridge. We also managed to sneak in a quick trip to Buntzen Lake on the outskirts of Port Moody.

But after four months of travelling; 10,593 miles; 2 Canadian Provinces, 1 Territory and 3 US states; oh, and 6,771 photographs (yes, really!) we have to hand the van back in less than 12 hrs time. To put our little road trip in context, if we had started our adventures in London, rather than Vancouver, and had driven in a straight line, rather than a somewhat twisted figure of eight, we would now be about 86 miles south east of downtown Melbourne.

So we have now returned to the RV park in Burnaby where we started our adventures back on 1st May. We moved 95%!o(MISSING)f our stuff into our new flat this afternoon, so the van feels somewhat empty. We’ll be sad to say goodbye to our little friend tomorrow. But there again, it is now time for a new phase in our adventures, and we look forward to that with great anticipation...!

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Photos

Beaver Wake
Honestly...!

Gold Creek Lower Falls, Golden Ears Provincial Park
We couldn't find mention of any "upper falls" in the guidebooks or the park maps!