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The Canada Adventure: Day 4: Saturday June 4th
Saturday 0900
Rolled out at 0700 to a very bright sun. The sun comes up real early and goes down real late. Last night with an overcast sky, we still had dusk at 2130. I think there is only 3 hours of darkness. Lovely Wife says it is because how far north we are. I shudder to think how short the days will be in the winter.
Today we are back to the bank and then grocery shopping.
We hit the bank & Eldest wasn't quite ready to commit to grocery shopping. We had lunch & then drove up north to the Capilano Bridge.
This is a suspension footbridge built in the late 1800s. It is 450 ft long and 250 ft over the river and it does sway and bounce quite a lot. Eldest wasn't thrilled about it, but I insisted. It was a great adventure. They also had trails running through a temperate rain forest as well as bridges and platforms built up into the trees. Sorta like the Ewok village in Return of the Jedi. One of the platforms was 100 ft off the forest floor (I hope they said ft & not cm or some other weird metric thing.)
After that we drove down to Horseshoe Bay and then to West Vancouver were we strolled by the ocean and sat & talked for a littled bit. Edlest called some of his friends, telling them he was watching huge ships head out of the bay into the Pacific Ocean.
Then we drove across the Lion's Gate Bridge into downtown Vancouver right at the start of rush hour. This time we didn't follow signs to the highway. We discovered that there really isn't a highway into & out of downtown. Imagine NW Expressway as your only way to get somewhere, that or mass transit.
Came home, ate dinner & went to see Lords of Dogtown. After that we found a casino that played Texas Hold 'Em. Eldest caught a game, won a few hands, but eventually lost.
A few random thoughts on Vancouver.
* a left turn lane should have a left turn arrow. If you do manage to find a break in traffic to make a left turn, the pedxers will block your way until a speeding bus destroys your car.
* An intersection of a main thoroughfare and a side street should not have stoplights on the major artery and a stop sign on the side street. The stoplights are for pedxers to use to cross. More than once I saw people jump out of their cars, press the pedx button and jump back in, just so they can make a left turn.
* You can't get on the highway unless your vehicle is capable of 50kpm, or you are on a bicycle.
* There is a deposit on plastic containers.
* You have to pay for plastic bags.
* Paying 7% federal tax and 7.5% Provincial tax on goods really sucks. On the plus side, if you spend over $50 & you're a tourist, you get a refund on the federal tax.
* The Taco Bells don't have chalupas
* There are a lot of panhandlers & hookers out on the streets. Even in nice parts of town.
