The first and last few days of the trip were spent in Vancouver. I don't normally like big cities, but was pleasantly surprised by Vancouver, with its harbours, bridges, parks and flowers. It was immaculately clean too, and for the most part we felt very welcome and comfortable! We did come across some less salubrious parts of the city on our wanderings (I have never seen so many homeless people or addicts in one place) but for a large city it was a nice place to spend a few days.
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| On the plane... It's rather a long way to Vancouver! |
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| Grid streets (or should I say "Blocks"?!) and skyscrapers... a far cry from Montbrio |
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| Quite a market for window cleaners? |
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| Our hire car and friend for the next six weeks! I love the patriotism that adorns every vehicle. |
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| Views of Vancouver from Grouse Mountain - yes we did the grouse grind (an hour of stair climbing as you slog up 853m (2,800 feet) in about 2km) rather than take the cable car to get here! |
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| Looking down on Vancouver |
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| Fruit displays at the amazing markets on Granville Island |
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| Too good to eat? |
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| Truly tempting! |
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| I was amazed by all the different coloured pastas... mmmm |
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| Bagel making before our eyes... shaped, boiled then into the fire ovens. Bread doesn't get much fresher than that! |
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| Houseboats on the harbour... we actually saw a seal swimming around them! |
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| A minicab tootles over to the Roger's Stadium... |
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| The Rogers Stadium - home to the Canucks ice hockey team. When we saw people milling around I thought we might be able to catch a cheeky pre-season game... turns out people were queuing for Linkin Park. Boo... |
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| Strange giant bird in the olympic village... |
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| Science World ball and the lights of Linkin Park... You can also see dragon boat teams training - it seems to be all the rage here! |
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| Saying goodbye to Vancouver from the plane! |
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| Over the Rockies and Columbia Icefields - who needs a charter helicopter flight when you have Air Transat? |
