Hayley & Shaun in Canada: Vancouver, B.C.

Tues 14th Dec - Fri 17th Dec 2010

Hello!

We arrived in Vancouver at about 3:30pm on Tuesday 14th December 2010. The plane from Sydney to LA with VAustralia was pretty cool, lots of entertainment and snacks etc. We both didn't get any sleep and it was pretty squishy. Shaun had the window, I was in the middle and unfortunately I had someone next to me so we couldn't really spread out. But at least he was nice when we needed to get up to go to the toilet or walk around all the time!

From what we saw of LA Airport, It wasn't very nice and could use some renovations ha ha! The flight from LA to Vancouver was quicker than we thought which was good as we were sick of being on a plane! Once in Vancouver, we checked in at Empire Landmark Hotel on Robson Street where we stayed for 3 nights. Robson Street is one of the longest streets in downtown Vancouver and has lots and lots of shops!

After trying to stay awake as long as possible, we went to sleep at about 7pm and woke up at 9pm thinking it was morning! Unfortunately it wasn't and we woke up a few more times through the night. The next morning we felt reasonably OK after jet lag and started off on our Vancouver sightseeing. We had pre-purchased a 2-day pass for the Vancouver "Hop-on Hop-off Trolley Tour". You could get on and off at plenty of stops around Vancouver and the downtown areas and the men driving the trolleys provided A LOT of commentary along the way.

Some of the sights we saw included Stanley Park, Granville Island, Chinatown, Yale Town, Lots of fancy 5-star hotels, lots of shopping districts and Gastown. The trolleys were really cool and looked like old trams, but they just drove around the normal roads like buses. We also set up our "Social Insurance Numbers" and did some shopping at 4th Avenue.

That night we managed to find an all-you-can-eat Japanese buffet for $14.95 so we ate all we could eat and it was pretty good!

The next day we used our trolley pass to go to the German Christmas Markets which only cost $2 to get in, however we shouldn't have bothered because it was so small and boring! Then we went to Canada Place (where the cruise ships go and lots of tourist info) and bought cheap ski tickets for Whistler and then got the SeaBus (like an indoor ferry) across to the North Shore.

From there we went to Grouse Mountain, a ski hill overlooking the city. We took the gondola up and had they had lots of Christmas things on so we saw a reindeer and had a short sleigh ride and looked at the view. Its pretty cool there because you're on the snow and you can be skiing while looking out over the city lights.

That day we also bought our mobile phones and had a nice dinner at Hurricane Grill in Yale Town.

On Friday the 17th we searched frantically all day for a car as we were supposed to leave for Whistler that day and after spending the day in North Shore wandering around aimlessly we decided just to get a Greyhound Bus that left at 6:30pm that night. We also had lunch at a chain burger restaurant "Red Robin" which was delicious and cheap!

Some things we noticed so far...

- 210 Starbucks just in Vancouver! Didn't go very far without seeing someone with a coffee in their hand! So of course we joined in but had hot chocolates all the time instead!
- The traffic lights made weird bird noises when it was safe to cross the intersection
- Toilets are almost full of water instead of really low and the handles for the showers are weird and really hard to use
- Gets dark at about 3:30-4pm so you think you should be having dinner and going to bed!
- Getting used to tipping and taxes is definitely different!

Read our Whistler blog to see what happened next! And see below for pics!

Love Hayley and Shaun xx