Day 53 -- Excursion to Vancouver BC

Saturday 8/12/2006

We slept well. It looks like we have a brewing problem with the voltage in the trailer. Somehow it looks as if it is being drained faster than I expected. And this is despite us trying real hard to use candles, separate lanterns, etc. I hope we can survive long enough that we pull out of here. The weather yesterday was quite nice but it did not look that nice this morning, or at least that is what we saw from deep under the tall trees by our campsite. The plan for today was to drive down to Vancouver and do some exploration. I got some hints from a site neighbor yesterday about places to see, etc. But we did not have a detailed map aside from Street Atlas USA, which appears to be pretty bad north of the border. After breakfast we headed down. We had been told about Granville Island and about some of the beaches in that area. It took a while to navigate through town to the beach area due to our bad map. But we finally ended up at the parking lot of Jerico Beach. There we were able to get a parking pass for the entire day that cost us only $5.

Erik enjoys the view at Jerico Beach in Vancouver, BC

Karl dips his toes in ocean #3 for this trip: The Pacific Ocean

After resting for a while at Jerico Beach we started to walk to Granville Island. I was told that this was supposed to be nearby. I asked some of the locals on the way and, eventually, walked into a Budget Car Rental office and asked for a map. It did not take us more than 20 minutes. It had already begun to warm up and the sky was clearing. We ate our picnic lunch in a nice park and then started to walk around. One of our first stops was at a kids toy marked. It was a two story building with many different toy stores. We split up for a while as the kids chased different things.

Isabella is trying to convince me she needs one more stuffed dragon

We then walked over into Granville Island Public Market, which is a set of interconnected buildings with many stands selling mainly food. Items are presented in very pleasing ways. You can buy lots of food to just eat as you walk along. We walked through several of the buildings and just watched. Our appetite was big, but we did not have much room for fresh food in our trailer.

Pastries at Granville Island Public Market

Isabella is browsing the small shops

Isabella is browsing the small shops

Pasta

Karl finds .. bacon .. what else?

Water separates Granville Island with the rest of Vancouver

After walking around a bit in the public marked we started to head back to Jerico Beach, following a northern loop around walkways. The day had turned into a great day. We saw many other great sites as we walked around. Here are some.

Marina by False Creek in Vancouver. Most buildings in the city appear to have blue/white overtones.

Erik and Karl play by a fountain on the way back to Jerico Beach

The boys stop to pick some wild raspberries along a walk path; Isabella refuses to try them

The kids watch a massive kite flying in a park. It almost looked like a guitar

Large logs continuously wash up on beaches in Vancouver from Fraser River

Driving a large pickup in downtown Vancouver was a challenge.
I frequently ended up straddling ped-xing:s, with locals honking their horns and people glaring.

We made a slight error on the way home and ended up following a windy road near the sea shore going north. We drove by many quite pretty houses with large and decorated yards. It was not hard to tell where affluent people hung out. Further away we snaked our way through plenty of road construction (in preparation for Winter Olympics in 2010 up in Whistler). At one point I made a mistake and ended up in a cluster of staging lanes for ferries. But Isabella found me a narrow passage out from that area that took us back on the road heading north.

When we came back home, the kids made a camp fire again. The voltage in the trailer had dropped to the point where it barely registered. I hoped that this would not cause us problem for tomorrow's hitch-up. Erik grilled burgers for dinner that we ate inside with the help of candles. It tasted great. Exhausted we went to bed somewhat early.

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All Pictures (c) 2006 Hamnqvist, Background features the Yukon Sky.