Vancouver, here we come

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Geo: 39.74, -104.992

Jeff's alarm went off at 4:50am this morning; he hit the snooze button. My alarm went off at 5am this morning; I hit the snooze button. Ten minutes later Jeff's alarm went off again, closely follow by mine. All right already! We're up....

It's been ten days since we've had a vacation and, personally, I think it's time for another. Happily Jeff agrees - why else would we be playing battling snooze buttons at this ungodly hour?

This vacation has a pretty funny backstory...Every year cruise ships that have been plying the Alaskan waters all summer are "repositioned" back down to LA or San Francisco for the winter cruises to Mexico and South. Repositioning cruises are short - there are even cruises of just one night - and repositioning cruises are much less expensive than "normal" cruises because there are no port fees as you don't stop anywhere in between.

Jeff had stumbled upon a great cruise deal...we would fly to Seattle (for free using our Southwest points), cruise one night up to Vancouver. Spend the day in Vancouver, get back ON THE SAME SHIP and cruise three nights to LA and fly home from there. Perfect!

The cruises were booked, the airfare arranged, it was a great plan until Princess Cruises called to say it was against federal law for us to do that. HUH?? Well, according to the "Passenger Services Act of 1866" that itinerary was illegal because Canada isn't considered a "far" foreign port. This Act was passed to protect American ship building interests in the 1800s. Since the US hasn't built cruise ships in many decades, it has obviously not kept up with the changed shipbuilding environment.

So...we could do one or the other, but not both. If we were getting on a different boat for one of the legs that would be legal, but that option wasn't available. We picked the 3 night cruise which leaves from Vancouver, British Columbia instead of Seattle.

And now it is time to get out of bed.

Here's our plan: fly to Seattle on Saturday (today) as planned, rent a car and drive to Vancouver. The ship leaves on Sunday, which is plenty of time to drive. This trip involves a first for us...hotel rooms in Vancouver are expensive and we're trying to do this little get away on the cheap.

After a bit of research we decide to try AirBNB for our one night stay in Vancouver. We sign up for AirBNB and check out the offerings. Jeff finds a 35 foot sailboat moored at the dock - I nix that idea immediately! (Mostly because a recent review says that the marine toilet doesn't work and there is a camp toilet.) No thank you. But we do laugh over the idea of getting back on a 35 foot sloop, and leaving it to board a cruise ship.

We are all the way to the Denver Airport before I realize I brought neither of the books I planned to read on the cruise. Other than that we think we have everything.

Our flight to Seattle was uneventful, and here is another first. We are in our rental car (a Jeep Cherokee) and as we are driving Jeff sees a sign and asks me "What is 'variable speed limit?'" Hmmm, I haven't a clue but take a wild, silly guess. "Maybe they have electronic speed limit signs; maybe if there is heavy traffic or an accident, they can drop the speed limit." Haha!Not two miles later we see that my silliness was true! There is a big electronic road sign that says "Heavy traffic ahead" and the speed limit sign on the side of the road has changed from 60 to 45 mph. In another mile, the speed limit sign says "30mph" That's cool! We've never seen that before. I'm writing this as we are currently crawling along I5 north.

Jeff drove the first two hours. When we switched and I started driving it started to rain. Canada hates me. And I was the driver when we got to the border - what a riot! I couldn't hear the border guy very well (and he looked about 14 years old), so everytime he asked a question I said "What?" and Jeff answered the question from the passenger's seat. He apparently thought we were harmless though and sent us on our way. The signage to the Vancouver airport is wonderful and after getting lost only once (because I pulled off to fill up the tank and got back onto the rerong road) we soon arrived at Vancouver Airport to return our rental car. When we were at the border crossing one. of the questions asked, according to Jeff, was "Do you have anything you are planning to leave in Canada?" Our answer was "No" and now we are wondering if we should have said "Yes, this car!"

We find and take the train to the Waterfront. When we get off the train we have about 8 blocks to walk to our Airbnb accommodations.

Our AirBNB hosts, Ashleigh and Aldo, were just delightful. We felt at home in about 2 minutes. Our bedroom was small but comfy; it was on the corner of the building and had floor to ceiling windows on two sides. Great city views! We had closet space, a small dresser, a desk and chair, and our own bathroom.
They gave us a key fob for the building's elevator (it is a secure building), a key to their apartment and a key to our bedroom. This made us feel comfortable that we weren't dealing with crazy people. We had been just a little apprehensive since we'd never used AirBNB before - turns out they have been AirBNB hosts for only about a month. We decided to learn together.

Ashleigh, a recent University graduate in International Business and current law student, provided us with restaurant recommendations, and the location of the nearest ATM, liquor and grocery stores. Jeff and I laid down for a rest but eventually got up to get our errands done. ATM? check. Liquor store? check. Grocery store? check. We dropped our bundles off "at home" and headed out for dinner.

We choose to eat at one of the places Ashleigh recommended, Cardero's, which is on the waterfront. The restaurant was very crowded so we opted to sit outside on their deck which was covered, well lit and had heaters. The atmosphere was relaxing and the food was GREAT! We had such a nice time.

After dinner, despite being exhausted, we walked the spacious, winding sidewalk alongside the waterfront. It had been raining (hard) off and on all evening but now the night was really pleasant. Soon we had walked all the way to the Vancouver Convention Center which is right next door to the cruise port, Canada Place. We were surprised that it was such an easy and short trek.

We made our way back home. Asleigh and Aldo had gone out for the evening, so we had the apartment to ourselves. While I sat at the desk in the bedroom writing Jeff stood in the dark in the living room looking out those floor to ceiling windows at the harbor.

Ashleigh and Aldo returned home, we said our goodnights and went to sleep.

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