I haven’t mentioned the b&b we stayed at in Vancouver. The West End Guest House was fascinating. Built in 1906, it’s very central, between the center of the city and Stanley Park; you can walk to Robson Street for shopping and dining. When we were there it was run by a young gay couple, and while I think they were in the process of refurbishing it (my diary suggests not everything was perfect), it now gets 5 stars from TripAdvisor. And the breakfast conversation was amazing. The other guests included a Scottish couple (leaving next morning for Moraine Lake near Banff, where we stayed in 2004), a British couple (eventually planning to go out to Tofino, before visiting a son in Melbourne), a Swiss couple, a Chinese couple, and an Iranian named Ali from Houston, Texas. The Chinese couple didn’t talk very much, although another guest said that the man’s English was better than his Chinese! We were there on the day of the Brexit referendum, and I remember having a long discussion on it with the British woman in the afternoon.
Exploring Vancouver
When we go to Vancouver, we almost always visit Van Dusen Gardens. And so we did this time. We spent an afternoon wandering around, looking at the changes they’d made since the last time. We’ve been there so often I only took a few photos this time; click here to see the whole gallery. I’ll share a couple of examples. This is their swamp garden:
And this is the fountain in the lake, which is kind of their signature view:
Feel free to go look at the whole gallery, and also to check the gallery I shot when we visited in 2011 – click here for that link.
The second day we were there, though, we did something new. We’ve found Vancouver’s Bard on the Beach Shakespeare company to be very rewarding, so we had bought tickets to their production of the Merry Wives of Windsor. Instead of just going out there for the play, however, we decided to spend the entire day in Kitsilano, which is a charming district in Vancouver fronting on English Bay. We’d stayed in Kitsilano before, but had never just hung out on the beach.
Waiting for the Ferry
After a pleasant weekend visiting our friends in Powell River, we drove off toward Vancouver. Powell River being where it is, our first stop was the Saltery Bay – Earl’s Cove ferry terminal. On a Monday morning, it wasn’t very busy, but the view was nice.
Saltery Bay Ferry terminal
Having nothing else to do, I got the camera out and went looking for things to photograph. By gum, I found a bald eagle perching in a tree next to the terminal.
Bald eagle
He eventually flew down and landed on the sandbar, where I couldn’t get a decent shot of him. I watched a 6-person canoe or scull paddle by:
Paddling down the inlet
Eventually the ferry came in:
Ferry arriving at Saltery Bay
The Saltery Bay ferry takes you just over the inlet to Earl’s Cove, after which you drive the length of the Sunshine Coast to the Langdale-Horseshoe Bay Ferry, which you take to the mainland. Then you drive on into Vancouver. I regret to say there are no reasonable photo ops from the Sunshine Coast Highway; it’s just a highway, mostly surrounded by tall trees on both sides. Pretty; hardly photographic. The drive takes about an hour and 20 minutes (79.8 km or not quite 50 miles).
I took some photos from the ferry, of the area around the Langdale ferry terminal, and of the trip among the islands as we traveled down to Vancouver; if you’d like to see them, the whole gallery is called Ferry to Vancouver.
On to Powell River
Janet, a girl I went to high school with in Napa, California, married in the late ’70s, and she and her husband Wes moved to Powell River, British Columbia, where they stayed and raised 2 children. When we’re in the area, we often go to visit them, and so in 2016.
Where, you ask, is Powell River?? Well, it’s on the B.C. coast, just north of the “Sunshine Coast” (which I normally associate with rain). From Vancouver it takes 2 ferry rides and about a half day driving. From Victoria, still a half day driving but only 1 ferry ride, from Comox to Powell River. It used to have a paper mill (Macmillan Bloedel), but that closed; now it’s mainly tourism.
Here’s the view across the strait from the Comox Ferry terminal, waiting for the ferry:
View from Comox Ferry terminal
The ferry looks like a ferry; there’s a photo in the gallery, to see the whole gallery click here.
Albion Manor, Victoria
I don’t have any photos from the ferry ride over to Victoria from Seattle. This is partly because it started at 7 AM, a time of day when I’m not fully functional. Besides, you don’t see much of interest from a ferry, just a lot of water. On that ride you didn’t even see many islands. When we got to Victoria, we rented a car and drove to the bed and breakfast where we’d reserved a room, called Albion Manor. (The link goes to a photo gallery; excerpts below.) We enjoyed it very much. First, it’s a beautiful house with varied and interesting decorations and gardens; it turned out one of our hosts had been a set designer, and still likes to pick up beautiful and odd items at auctions. Second, our hosts and their staff ran the place very well and served us wonderful breakfasts. Our room was in the basement and was very comfortable. Here’s a picture of the house.
Albion Manor
