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Published: June 20th 2012
17th June 2012 - Getting ready to go to Canada. Today is the day we leave New Zealand for Canada. After a big rush the night before we are glad just to make it to the airport, it was good having lots of friends and family around to see us off. The plane trip to Auckland was fun and a lot quicker with Rosie there. We arrived in Auckland and waited for check in for our international flight. After 6 ½ hours, KFC twice, arcade games, a hundred laps of the airport and the worlds craziest massage chairs that poked you in places you don’t want to be poked, we said goodbye to Rosie and were off through to international departures. We checked in and boarded the aeroplane to begin our flight.
The flight was good and the food was OK. It was very long (duh it is 12 hours!!) Flying into Vancouver was awesome, the city was huge. The line through immigration took so long there were so many people in the line before us but when we got to the counter we flew through. When we got to the airport we went to BK (of course) but
ordered something different, called Maple Poutine, which basically stands for fries with cheese, bacon and maple syrup melted together like a bowl of wedges. We are still trying to decide how to pronounce Poutine.
We got picked up and taken to our home for the next three nights, we moved our gear into the room and quickly head down town to a huge mall. We looked around, got some tea and came back to the guesthouse.
Somehow we think this holiday is going to have lots of food involved.
It is tricky getting used to adding HST onto all the prices. Also when we broughtt coca cola it said it was $4 but you get to the counter and they add 12%!((MISSING)48c) for HST, add Recycling tax of 12c and Deposit of 60c which makes it $5.20. Don’t ask us what Deposit is!
18th June 2012 - Stanley Park We went to Stanley Park today, the park is huge, we walked over 25km around the park and didn’t get to see everything.
We went to Beaver Lake which is slowly disappearing and will one day just become part of the forest. We watched a
little duckling walk across the lily pads which was really cute.
While walking through the park Shane dodged what he thought was a ‘poo’ but when we looked closer it was actually a giant Banana Slug "it was huge". We saw a squirrel, which I tried to tell Shane was a racoon, I was wrong it was definitely a squirrel because we saw a racoon later in the day. A man told us that the racoons just mooch around and they wont bother you unless you have a packet of chips.
We walked around the seawall of Stanley Park where they have a path for walking and a path for biking/skating which made the walk a lot easier you didn’t have to dodge bikes except when you forgot and crossed into a bike lane and nearly got hit YIKES!
While walking we came across some seagulls trying to eat starfish, we watched them for a while and they were going into the water and foraging them out from under the rocks. It looks really weird when they eat them because starfish are not the right shape to try swallow whole. We saw the Lions Gate Bridge which is
a huge suspension bridge.
We missed the Totems on our first trip, so when we got back to the beginning we went around a bit again to see them. They were really cool and they had plaques which told you what the totems mean and what they are carvings of. We purchased our first souvenir here, our very own totem.
We had our first hotdog in Stanley Park, it was not what we expected, maybe it was because we forgot to tip him.
19th June 2012 - Capilano Suspension Bridge Today we went to North Vancouver, we caught the Skytrain to the Waterfront, then the Seabus to North vancouver and a bus to Capilano Suspension Bridge.
At the Capilano Suspension Bridge all the staff were dressed in historical outfits. We walked through Kia’palano where there were more totems. We made our way across the Suspension Bridge (137 metres long and 70 metres high). They say that the bridge can hold 96 elephants (I hope so because a lot of people were crossing at the same time).
We wandered through the rainforest and did the Nature’s Edge walk which had great views of the river
and forest. Saw the “Fallen Tree” which is a 46 ton tree that fell on the suspension bridge in 2006 in a storm, the tree snapped in half but the bridge stayed strong. We also did the Treetops Adventure which is a lot of smaller suspension bridges hanging high up between the trees.
Our favourite part of the Park was the Cliffwalk, a suspended walkway along sheer granite cliff faces with great views of the canyon. And in some parts glass floor!
We got to the end and because we did everything and collected all the stamps on our map/passport we got a certificate that says “I made it across world-famous Capilano Suspension Bridge” (I know I’m like a little kid =P ).
We then caught the bus and Seabus back to Vancouver where we walked through Gastown and Chinatown, where we found the Steam Clock and lots of souvenir shops, we also came across Hastings Street which would have to be one of the worst, drug addicted, homeless ridden places we have ever seen. We got out of there as quick as we could. We wanted a picture of the gates to Chinatown but it was
not a place to get the camera out.
We caught the Skytrain back to where we are staying. On our walk back to the guesthouse we got to see another cute squirrel.
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Karen Wilson
non-member comment
Awesome pictures
Awesome pictures Amanda and Shane looking forward to more updates