Wednesday, May 29, 2013

Vancouver, British Columbia

Seattle was one of my favorite trips that we took last year, so I had high hopes for Vancouver as well. We had originally planned to use Jason’s gold passes, but ended up not needing to. This is great news as we can now use those to go to Mexico or the Caribbean with a confirmed seat!

The trip really started Friday morning when we drove from Seattle into Vancouver. This was only around a 3 hour drive (with border crossing) even with a bridge collapse causing a detour to our route. We got in around lunch time and immediately went hiking after a quick bite to eat. We had been told that Lynn Canyon has great hiking and a really cool suspension bridge. We choose a 3 hour hike that was really nice. The weather was beautiful and it was so nice to just be outdoors all day.





That night, we went to go grab some of Vancouver’s famously good sushi at a place called Aki. It was so incredibly fresh and honestly pretty cheap. Overall, Vancouver is super expensive, but we lucked out with this place!
The next morning, we went to Honey’s Doughnuts to grab some grub before we went hiking AGAIN! I got a delicious maple and Jason got a honey “doughnut” that were more like really dense cake. With some coffee to warm us up, we set off to hike the Baden Powell trail in Deep Cove. This was definitely a more rigorous hike, but once we got up to the top, we had some crazy views of the water.




That afternoon, we rented bikes to explore Stanley Park. This park is roughly the same size as Central Park, but that’s really the only comparison. It’s set on the seawall and you can bike around the entire thing in a few hours. It really has everything you could ever want – beaches, stunning views, forests, gardens, an aquarium and more. I have never been to a place like this before. It was pretty spectacular.




 
From the park, we caught an “Aquabus” to Granville Island (we could bring our bikes along too) and explored the tiny island. There is a daily farmer’s market, shops of every kind (my favorite was a hat shop) and even a water park! We stopped in at Granville Island Brewery for a tasting before we finished our walk around the island. Overall, it was perfect, but exhausting, second day.

Our last day in Vancouver, we drove the Sea to Sky Highway up to Whistler. This was the most beautiful drive I’ve ever been on (Jason’s is still Road to Hana on Maui). We had a view of the Howe Sound almost the entire way. It was only about an hour and ½ drive from downtown and once we made it there, we…went hiking of course! We hiked about 6km along the Cheakamus River which eventually turned into the lake. It was a very fun hike – probably our favorite!









We made a quick stop around downtown Whistler before heading back towards Seattle to catch an early am flight the next day. Vancouver was amazing and the most beautiful city we’ve been to. Everything was so green, everyone was outside and active and Canadians are just so darn friendly. I love the Pacific Northwest and definitely want to make many trips back there. I would love to see the San Juan Islands and spend a few days hiking around Mount Rainier. I am also looking forward to attending a wedding in Portland later this year. Out of all the places we’ve been, Seattle feels the most like home and I could definitely see us living here somewhere down the road.
Well, this was our last “together” trip for quite a while. Jason has a trip for work to do a station audit (somewhere REALLY awesome – I’m jealous!) and I have a conference, girls’ trip and a few weddings to attend. Jason is over travel, but I’m still in that travel routine. I’m glad I have a few things lined up within the next few months. When we’re just here in Dallas, sometimes I get bored not having trips to plan and cities to explore. Not the worst problem in the world, I know. Next up - Girls' Weekend in OKC in a few weeks!

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