After a week in the US it was finally time for us to head off alone and explore Canada eh? We were very tempted to stay in the States, but if we didn’t go to Canada we’d need to redo the title of the blog and we ain’t got time for that.

First stop, Vancouver, one of the ‘most liveable’ cities in the world and it’s not hard to see why…everyone on the streets seems very much alive. That’s unfortunately only half true, there seem to be more people living rough here than we recall seeing on our first trip to San Francisco, and significantly more than our trip to Monaco.

October is generally the 4th wettest month of the year in what is a VERY wet city, so, of course, with our luck, we didn’t see a cloud the entire time we were there. The downside to this was that we felt obliged to engage in some of the many outdoor activities, such as: Wandering the impeccably maintained Capilano suspension bridge and park grounds (even more unfortunate were the incessant calls to ‘squeeze me, honey, honey…’) and catch the gondola up Grousse mountain. A mountain so good it was named by my sister in the late 80s. It could so easily have been “Choice mountain” (early 90s) or “Tattslotto Mountain” (late 90s). We partook in one of our favourite sunny day activities of drinking while taking in the view, and got to see two grizzlies frolicking in what seemed a rather poorly constructed enclosure. Lea, desperate to contribute, described the scene as ‘unbearably cute’, which will go down as one of the lowlights of the trip…only because of my feelings of guilt, what have I done to this poor girl.

We were lucky enough to see the bears, but didn’t manage to see any beavers. However, this didn’t stop the Vancouverians from using the beaver title almost everywhere, from the name of lakes, parks, creeks, etc to its common appearance on menus. I’m sure some of the dishes, such as beaver stew etc, didn’t use real beaver. But if they used some faux beaver surely they should call it “murkin stew” to be clear?? And with so many menus dedicated to beaver, I’m surprised nobody was clever enough to offer up a surprise palette cleanser, or an…amuse bush…

Vancouver impressed us greatly, with everywhere playing easy listening from the 70s, 80s, 90s and the now (ie. James and Lea’s home playlist) and gentle waft of dope, wait that’s not cool, let’s say marijuana cigarettes in the air, there were just a couple of things that we found strange. Long lines at bars and restaurants even through there were an abundance of free tables (just not enough servers for the host to assign extra tables too!) and the fact that everyone stared at us a little more than usual. Lots of ‘heys’ and even one high 5 for James makes us sure he must “bear” (Lea again) a resemblance to what we hope is some current superstar for the Canucks or Roughriders, but a more likely is to a retired curler who’s let himself go.

Lea made the mistake of commenting that we’d had more Caesar salads than burgers on the trip (pre-BC, 2:3). So we sure made up for it here (post BC, burgers 6: Caesars 3, see photos for proof). In Vancouver, Lea had an incredible burger with truffle aioli on the side which she said was the best so far…and that’s the truffe!!!

After Vancouver, we somehow managed to find ourselves in another wineland, a mere 6 hour drive away! #chasingthegrape #raisindetre We only had 2 days to explore, day 1 was enough for Lea to say, “..this is without doubt the prettiest wineland we’ve visited…this year…I mean this financial year…”. By the end of day 2, we conceded the full 2018 was beaten. I guess we only went to 7 in NZ.

After wine, we headed to the mountains, with our final base camp in Revelstoke. <Revelstoke paragraph>