Vancouver & Surrey

It has been a busy month, and I find myself flying even when I'm not flying. Nicole's movie got into a film festival in Vancouver, so we made an effort to attend. The nonrev game is not for everyone and a lot of legwork (literally) to get to Vancouver from LAX. Our first priority was a SkyWest flight for United out of terminal 8. It was showing full, so as a backup we would do WestJet leaving 50 minutes later from terminal 3, the furthest point from terminal 8. In spite of this, once we found out for certain that we wouldn't get on United, we made it to the WestJet gate at Terminal 3 just as they were calling our names. Phew. We were sweaty and tired, but had seats (albeit separate). Three hours later, we landed in Vancouver.

We rented a car because if nothing else, it was a place to store our bags the next day as we went to the festival. We drove downtown in some traffic and rain, but eventually arrived at the Le Soleil. It was in a prime location close to the waterfront. After getting settled and grabbing a donut at Tim Horton's, we walked around for a bit. It was dark out already, so it felt much later than it actually was. We walked along the waterfront in light drizzle which slowly increased in its intensity. By the time we got to the Cactus Club (a popular chain restaurant in these parts) we were rather soaked. I splurged and had a steak and a beer. It was actually fairly reasonably priced. After our relaxing dinner, we walked briskly back to the hotel and snuggled in for the night.

The next day, we woke up to even more rain than the previous night. It was an umbrella kind of day. Checkout time was a reasonable 12pm rather than the standard American checkout time of 10am. Since we couldn't really do much outside, we chose to get tickets for Flyover Canada, a large-screen ride that transports you over various landmarks in Canada. Think of it like Soarin' at Disney, except Canada. In fact, it's very likely made by the same company. Instead of scents of oranges sprayed at us, we got smells of pine trees and mists from Niagara Falls. It was about 8 minutes long and probably not worth the price we paid for it, but Nicole was able to get a Canada flag pin to add to her camera bag, so it was all worth it in the end.

After all that, we checked out and drove to Surrey, the location of the film festival. We met with Nicole's composer for lunch and then went to check out the movie at the theater inside a university. It seemed to be received well, and the Indian humor seemed to really hit its mark with the primarily South Asian audience. Nicole did the obligatory schmoozing after the screening, answered a few questions, and we rushed off to the airport, grabbed some Tim Horton's and flew back on WestJet to Los Angeles, where it was 85 degrees.

Vancouver, eh?

I do realize I now post like twice a year, but thanks to my ever-improving seniority, I'm getting mostly locals, and rarely have an overnight. If I do get one, it's often quite brief. I did end up getting a long-ish Vancouver overnight, arriving around noon and not departing until the following morning. Our hotel was close to the airport (which is not close to the city). This made it a bit of a challenge to get downtown. I had to walk a mile and a half to the nearest train stop (with a brief stop at Tim Horton's enroute), then a 20 minute ride to the city center station.

From there, it was another couple miles to reach Stanley Park - my destination. Stanley Park is like Vancouver's Central Park, a large expanse of greenery in an otherwise urban area. I mapped out a route to hit most of the highlights of the park without running out of energy. There is a bike / pedestrian path that encircles the park along the seawall. This seemed to be a popular choice, and appeared a bit congested, so I altered my route to go directly inland toward an area called Beaver Lake.

I didn't encounter anyone during my walk through the trees in the interior of the park. It was nice. Eventually I reconnected with a main trail on the opposite end of the park near Lion's Gate Bridge. I then marched down the hill from this spot back down to the seawall to walk around the park back toward the entrance.

This took a considerable amount of time, and by the time my day was complete, I had logged some 12 miles or so. On the way, there were a few sights to break up the strain on my feet. One of them is known as "girl in a wetsuit," and is like Vancouver's answer to the mermaid in Copenhagen. Toward the end, I stopped at the park of Totems before limping my way for another few miles to the train station and back to the hotel and the attached Denny's Restaurant.